Private messages exchanged between star presenters and Fox News executives expose the channel’s lies in broad daylight. According to information collected by the voting machine company “Dominion” in the context of a defamation lawsuit, the ultra-conservative media would have deliberately disseminated false information concerning the accusations of rigging the American presidential election of 2020.
In a legal document filed Thursday, February 16, in the Delaware court, the Dominion company gives evidence of the willful manipulation of Fox News towards its audience. During the months following the presidential election between Donald Trump and Joe Biden, the hosts of this media propagated the narrative, pushed by the Trump camp, of a “stolen election”, made possible by a rigging of the voting machines of Dominion in several states.
Dozens of private messages plunge Fox News into turmoil
At a press conference in November 2020, Donald Trump’s lawyer and adviser, Sidney Powell had named Dominion accused of electoral fraud, without advising any evidence. She then alleged that the company had developed a fraud system, which would have enabled the late President Hugo Chavez to win the Venezuelan presidential election in 2013. According to Sidney Powell, the Dominion software used during the American presidential election had the capabilities to “define and run an algorithm that has probably worked across the country, to take a certain percentage of votes from President Trump and return them to President Biden.”
False information taken up and relayed by the Fox News channel, even though its journalists and decision-makers admitted in private that they did not believe in their veracity. During an investigation filed in court by Dominion, which is seeking 1.6 billion in damages from the chain for defamation, the company multiplied the interviews and obtained written exchanges between Fox News officials during this period.
“Sidney Powell is lying,” wrote Tucker Carlson, Fox News’ most right-wing host, on November 16 (13 days after the election). “I have a high tolerance for crazy people, but Powell is too much,” he adds later. In another message, he acknowledged that Fox News viewers “are good people and they believe in the allegations of voter fraud.” “This whole story that Sidney was pushing, I didn’t believe for a second,” presenter Sean Hannity also said in private messages.
Rupert Murdoch himself – media mogul and owner of the channel – laments in an email “really crazy stuff, that’s going to cause damage”, as he watches the press conference of Donald Trump’s advisers.
Keep favor with the Trump camp to save the hearing
Despite these private comments, the channel decided at the time to give prominence to accusations of voter fraud fabricated by the Trump camp. For the other American TV giant CNNFox news is actually “terrified of its own audience”, and would have acted for the sole purpose of not losing viewership.
After the election, former incumbent President Donald Trump had indeed let his anger show through at Fox News, which had been the first to announce the victory of his competitor Joe Biden in the key state of Arizona, then to announce his victoire. In the weeks following the results, Donald Trump and the Republican camp had thus been very critical of the television channel – so far remained a faithful ally. A public lynching that had caused Fox News to lose part of its ultra-conservative audience. While Newsmax, another even more right-wing and pro-Trump channel, gained a new audience.
It is this situation which would have caused panic among the leaders of the chain. “Do the leaders understand the credibility and the confidence that we have lost with our public?”, worried Tucker Carlson in a text message sent to his producer. “An alternative like Newsmax could be devastating for us,” he continued. Other emails obtained by Dominion reveal that Rupert Murdoch himself said in an exchange with general manager Suzanne Scott that he did not want to “upset Trump any further”, pointing to “everything that is at stake here”.
“Making false claims about voter fraud was a way for Fox to win back its audience,” writes the New York Times in an editorial. “It reveals how obsessed Carlson and other high-profile Fox News figures were with viewership, and their fear of being overwhelmed by even more right-wing outlets like Newsmax,” the paper continued. “It’s remarkable how bad ratings make good reporters do bad things,” Bill Sammon privately points out on December 2, 2020, when he was the network’s editor at the time. Washington, again according to documents collected by Dominion.
For CNN, “the messages underscore that Fox News has failed to live up to the basic journalistic principle that news organizations are supposed to relay information to viewers, without fear or favour.” If the honeymoon between the Republican camp and Fox News has been temporarily put on hold, the channel could still suffer from its loyalty to Donald Trump in the event of a conviction at the end of the trial.