Dominion wants ‘accountability’ over Fox News election lies, co-founder says
Dominion Voting Systems, which last month reached a $787.5m settlement of its $1.6bn defamation case against Fox News, is seeking wider accountability for the broadcast of Donald Trump’s election fraud lies and will “not … stop until we get it”, a co-founder said.
A Dominion lawyer, meanwhile, said he hoped messages redacted in court filings but reportedly linked to the dramatic firing of Tucker Carlson would soon be revealed.
John Poulos, chief executive of Dominion, Hootan Yaghoobzadeh, an investor from Staple Street Capital, and Stephen Shackelford, a partner at Susman Godfrey, the law firm representing Dominion, spoke to Axios in an interview published on Monday.
Fox still faces a $2.7bn suit from Smartmatic, another election machine company targeted by Trump and his allies in their lies about voter fraud in his 2020 defeat by Joe Biden.
Axios noted that Dominion is pursuing defamation lawsuits against two Fox competitors, One America News and NewsMax, and four Trump allies: Sidney Powell, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Lindell and Patrick Byrne.
Poulos said: “As we said from the beginning, we’re seeking accountability and we’re not going to stop until we get it. We have six more cases and we are completely aligned as we have been from the beginning.”
The settlement in Dominion’s Fox case came as the two sides waited in court in Delaware for trial to begin.
Shackelford said the suit and settlement “should send a big signal to the other defendants that we are serious about exposing the truth, and we are serious about accomplishing full compensation and justice for Dominion”.
Fox was not required to issue an on-air apology but the case uncovered a mine of internal messages which showed executives and hosts acknowledged that Trump and allies were lying but gave them airtime anyway.
Last week, Fox fired the prime-time host Tucker Carlson. The extent to which the decision was linked to Dominion remains unknown, if subject to extensive reporting.
Yaghoobzadeh said: “I think the consequences of the entire strategy that we pursued are starting to reflect themselves.”
Shackelford said Dominion “did not insist on them firing Tucker Carlson as part of the settlement. But the very fact that that’s what resulted out of all of this, and it’s traceable from the work that Dominion and Staple Street set in motion, that’s the sort of stuff Hootan is talking about.”
It has been reported that messages redacted in court filings contain instances of Carlson using “highly offensive” language about Fox executives.
Shackelford said: “Of course I know what’s in the redacted stuff and I can’t say anything about it … I hope that it all gets un-redacted at some point.”
He added: “We expected [Fox] to fight tooth and nail and to pull out all the stops, and they did. The scariest part of what they did trying to rewrite first amendment law just to save Fox’s hide in a way that was completely, in my view, disingenuous and dangerous.”
Yaghoobzadeh pointed to the continuing careers of other anchors who spread Trump’s lies, prominently including Maria Bartiromo.
“I just don’t know how informed every Fortune 500 CEO is to the lack of journalistic standards that were used in that initial broadcast,” Yaghoobzadeh said, about Bartiromo’s businessoriented show.
“And if they’re deciding to go on that show after understanding all that information, I’m not one to judge these things but I certainly wouldn’t go on that show.”
Asked for comment, Fox News pointed to a previous statement in which it said it was “pleased to have reached a settlement”, acknowledged rulings “finding certain claims about Dominion to be false”, and claimed the deal “reflects Fox’s continued commitment to the highest journalistic standards”.