WILMINGTON, Del. — Lawyers for Fox News and a voting machine company tangled Wednesday over the high bar to prove defamation in a $1.6 billion lawsuit that has embarrassed the conservative network over its airing of false claims related to the 2020 presidential election.
The argument is at the heart of each side’s attempt to persuade a Delaware judge that he should grant summary judgment in its favor and avoid a jury trial scheduled to start next month that would focus in part on media protections afforded in a nearly six-decade-old libel standard.
Denver-based Dominion Voting Systems claims that Fox program hosts, with the knowledge of executives for both Fox News and parent company Fox Corp., repeatedly allowed allies of former President Donald Trump to falsely claim that the machines and the software the company used were responsible for Trump’s election loss. Documents released during the lawsuit have shown that top Fox executives and personalities didn’t believe the claims but aired them anyway.
Fox contends that it can’t be held liable for defamation for simply reporting on newsworthy allegations — a sitting president’s claim that the election was being stolen from him.
Fox attorney Erin Murphy argued Wednesday that the parent company cannot be held “vicariously liable” simply because Fox Corp. executives, including chairman Rupert Murdoch, might have had knowledge of who was appearing on Fox shows and sometimes communicated with Fox News officials.
“Fox Corp. doesn’t belong in the case at all,” she said.
Murphy also argued that Dominion cannot demonstrate that anyone at Fox Corp. acted with actual malice without first proving that that person directly participated in any of 17 programs that aired between Nov. 8, 2020, and Jan. 26, 2021, in which the allegedly defamatory statements were made. In addition to the programs, Dominion is claiming that three tweets from former Fox Business Network host Lou Dobbs were defamatory.
Dobbs repeatedly offered a platform for Trump lawyer Sidney Powell to make unproven allegations about Dominion. Murphy argued that Dobbs often went “out of his way” to acknowledge evidence on the other side and explained why he had doubts. He also offered several invitations for Dominion representatives to appear on his show but was always turned down, Murphy said.
“I don’t think that’s consistent with actual malice,” she said.
Her comments came one day after Delaware Superior Court Judge Eric Davis said…
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