Billionaire Fox Corporation Chair Rupert Murdoch thought all the noise spewed by former President Donald Trump during his “stop the steal” hoax was “bullshit and damaging.” However, the thought of curbing the spread of an incredibly dangerous conspiracy wasn’t at the top of his mind back then. He was focused on keeping the Fox News money machine rolling.
According to redacted filings by Dominion Voting Systems on Monday, Murdoch said that he regretted “not being stronger in denouncing” the claims of election fraud. But at the time, he was still pushing for Republican candidates to gain victory, even going so far as to hand Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner “confidential information” about now-President Joe Biden’s advertising plans and debate strategy, according to Dominion’s filings.
Dominion is currently in an ongoing $US1.6 ($2) billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News over allegations the network promoted the bogus “stop the steal” campaign.
These new documents from Dominion’s summary judgment motion come little more than a week after Dominion revealed emails and texts between leading Fox News execs and hosts like Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, and Laura Ingraham. Those messages showed leading voices at Fox were very sceptical of those who spread Trump’s election lies, but kept hosting them anyway out of concern for their audience’s reaction and the company’s bottom line.
Murdoch is known for sticking real close to folks on the political right. He could be considered the granddaddy for the vast majority of the conservative media apparatus. News Corp, which was founded by the 91-year-old, is owned by the Murdoch family. The company owns tabloids like The Sun and The Times as well as major outlets like Dow Jones & Company, which owns The Wall Street Journal among others. And of course, Murdoch owns Fox Corporation. He seems to pay particular attention to Fox News above most of his other brands.
In a statement, Fox News told news outlets like CNN that the ongoing lawsuit “has always been more about what will generate headlines than what can withstand legal and factual scrutiny as illustrated by them now being forced to slash their fanciful damages demand by more than half a billion dollars after their own expert debunked its implausible claims.” The network further said Dominion’s summary judgment motion was “unsupported” by defamation law that would prevent journalists from covering political allegations such as Trump’s claims.
Dominion has sued other entities for defamation for allegedly pushing election denier claims, but none of those have captured the public’s attention like the ongoing suit against Fox. The outlet still remains the U.S.’ most-watched cable news channel. Shows like Tucker Carlson Tonight and Hannity receive 3.38 million and 2.57 million average viewers each night, respectively.
Following are some of the most wild allegations about Murdoch and other Fox execs in the weeks following the 2020 election.
Murdoch Handed Trump’s Family Biden’s Ad Plans
Rupert Murdoch was so close to the Republican election machine that he was actively willing to hand over “confidential information about Biden’s ads, along with debate strategy,” according to the Dominion summary judgment motion. These apparently included ads before they went public in what is allegedly an attempt to give Trump’s campaign an edge in the lead-up to the November, 2020 election.
Then, after election night when Fox News called Arizona for Biden, Kushner reportedly called Murdoch saying “this is terrible.” The News Corp owner said he could hear Trump shouting in the background. Murdoch then reportedly said “well, the numbers are the numbers.”
Murdoch Says Fox Wasn’t Interested in Red Versus Blue. It Wanted ‘Green.’
Perhaps the most emblematic quote of what the ongoing Dominion allegations mean for Fox, Murdoch said the reason he continued to offer a platform to “MyPillow guy” Mike Lindell, a verbose election conspiracist, was because “It is not red or blue, it is green.”
The Dominion fillings allege that in mid-December, Lindell said Fox was “in on stealing the election from Trump.” Subsequently, Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott sent him a personal note and gift and suggested Lindell gets good ratings on Fox.
Though Murdoch said he could have told Fox News to stop running Lindell’s ads, he reportedly said “The man is on every night. Pays us a lot of money… At first you think it’s comic, and then you get bored and irritated.”
The Fox Founder Said He Could Have Stopped Hosts Bringing On Powell and Giuliani
Murdoch outright said that he could have put his foot down on bringing on some of the most powerful and prominent election deniers, namely lawyers Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani.
In the deposition, the News Corp founder was asked if he could have told Fox CEO Scott to stop putting Powell on the air, he “could have.” As for Giuliani, “I could have. But I didn’t.”
This was despite his previous texts and emails showing he thought what was coming out of Powell and Giuliani’s mouth was “Terrible stuff damaging everybody, I fear. Probably hurting us [Fox News] too.”
Murdoch ‘Urged’ Fox to Fire Conspiracist Lou Dobbs, But Nothing Happened
The Fox Corporation Founder admitted that prominent Fox political commentator Lou Dobbs, as well as Maria Bartiromo, were endorsing election misinformation, but seemed to imply it was not as bad since they were just “commentators.”
According to the documents, Murdoch “suggested, or urged” execs to fire Dobbs because he “was an extremist.” That didn’t stop Dobbs from hosting his show all the way through the election and beyond. Murdoch said in his deposition: “They should be reprimanded… maybe got rid of” when Fox executives knowingly allowed conspiracists to broadcast lies.
Fox would eventually cancel Lou Dobbs Tonight in February, 2021.
Even When Fox Called Arizona for Biden, Murdoch Suggested Firing The Guy Who Called It
While the Fox Washington Bureau desk was quick to call Arizona for Biden after polls closed, that didn’t sit well with Republicans and, apparently, the Fox owner himself.
Bill Sammon was the bureau desk chief who oversaw the Arizona call. Murdoch suggested to Fox execs “Maybe best to let Bill go right away,” because that would “be a big message with Trump people.” Sammon was “told the inevitable” that night Murdoch sent the message on Nov. 20, 2020, according to the Dominion docs. Sammon later announced he was retiring at the end of January, 2021.
Murdoch Was Allegedly Adamant Republicans Could Not Lose Sen. Graham
The Fox News head was so involved in Republican politics he instructed top company execs and one of its most popular talk show hosts to say nice things about at least one GOP candidate who was up for reelection.
The summary judgment motion mentions that in October, 2020, when Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham was running for his seat, he told Fox CEO Scott “You probably know about the Lou Dobbs outburst against Lindsey Graham. Could Sean [Hannity] say something supportive?”
As if to make his connection to Republicans even more explicit, he reportedly told Scott “We cannot lose the Senate if at all possible.” Scott then responded she had “addressed the Dobbs Outburst.”
Who Was Endorsing the Election Denial Conspiracy, According to Murdoch
The Fox Corporation chair did eventually come out and admit that many of Fox News’ own hosts and commentators were actively promoting the long-debunked stolen election theory. He said host Bartiromo was an active supporter, same goes for host Jeanine Pirro and Dobbs. As for Hannity, Murdoch said he was supporting election denial “a bit.”
The filing shows he still denied that “Fox” as an entity was supporting the stolen election conspiracy, but full on admitted that “commentators” were all behind the big lie.
“Yes. They endorsed,” he said.