New revelations about the tense relationship between Fox News and Donald Trump in the fall of 2020 have emerged in a trove of thousands of court documents released on Sunday as part of a massive defamation lawsuit filed against the network by voting technology company Smartmatic.
One exchange showed that Lachlan Murdoch, the chief executive of Fox News parent company Fox Corp, told star anchor Sean Hannity in a 1 October 2020 text chain that Trump could not appear on Fox again if he attacked the network.
“Sean, sorry, but the president is not coming back on air if he uses it to attack us,” Murdoch wrote to a group that also included his father, Rupert, and Fox News CEO Suzanne Scott. “It is the same rule we have with the other side. This is a golden rule,” signing the message with “Thx L.” (In a 1 October 2020 interview with Hannity, Trump said Fox was “a much different place than it used to be”.)
Hannity’s response to Murdoch’s message was redacted. The situation got worse in the wake of the 2020 presidential election, when many Fox News supporters turned against the network, including Trump himself, leading to something of an existential crisis at the long-dominant channel.
In a separate correspondence after the November 2020 presidential election, after many Trump supporters had grown angry at Fox News over its call of the state of Arizona for Joe Biden, Hannity acknowledged the anger from the president’s side. “Trump people hate Fox,” he wrote to a producer. “Hate hate hate.”
While Fox publicly stood behind its Arizona call in the face of internal and external blowback, according to a 6 November 2020 email from Scott, Lachlan Murdoch said that Fox should consider reversing its call of the state of Arizona for Biden if his margin fell below 1% of the vote. “I’m not recommending we do that at this time,” Scott said.
The documents released on Sunday are copies of the exhibits that were cited in previous filings between the parties. They include both longer versions of previously cited conversations and many new internal text messages and email exchanges that have not previously been made public.
In a previously unreported 23 November 2020 email to his son, Rupert Murdoch suggested they chat about the viewer backlash against Fox News. “Getting killed in audience numbers,” he wrote. “All day long. We have to keep our nerve but worth a discussion. Won’t hurt subscriber revenue, but will soon cut into [advertisements].” Lachlan Murdoch wrote that he would call his father the following morning. “Agree re FNC,” he wrote. “Keeping me awake at night.”
In another previously unreported 21 January 2021 email to his son Lachlan, Rupert wrote that he was “still getting criticism for [Fox News Channel]. Saying leading voices encouraged stolen election bullshit and pushed Jan 6 rally.” In the same thread, Murdoch talked about ousting business network host Lou Dobbs. “Just take him off the air and negotiate later,” he wrote. Dobbs’s show was cancelled the following month.
The elder Murdoch also talked about hiring former Democratic National Committee chair Donna Brazile, saying that it’s “hard to attack a Black woman”.
The documents released on Sunday also included a version of Smartmatic’s deposition of Rupert Murdoch. When asked by a Smartmatic lawyer whether he took any steps “to make sure that hosts with shows on Fox News Media did not endorse claims about the 2020 election being stolen,” Rupert Murdoch responded: “No. No.”
“I was very happy [with] the way Fox News was handling it,” Rupert Murdoch said of the network’s post-election coverage.
Rupert Murdoch also acknowledged that Fox News made a decision to “pivot” after the election by “moving away from our support of Trump”. But he said it was difficult to do so. “Our very large audience tended to be Trump supporters,” he said. “We didn’t want to upset them totally. That, we did before. They’d been attacking us.”
Murdoch also affirmed that he believed Trump’s claims of a stolen election contributed to the January 6 US Capitol attack – though he denied it was a “riot” and said it was “intended to be just be a rally outside the Capitol”.
In his own deposition, Lachlan Murdoch said he didn’t think Fox News did anything to “endorse” claims of election fraud made by Trump’s supporters. He also re-affirmed the journalistic value of covering the president’s election fraud claims. “I can’t imagine a more newsworthy story than the sitting president of the United States calling into question the election results,” he said, according a transcript of his deposition.
“We did not make the allegations against Smartmatic. The president and his lawyers and associates made the allegations against Smartmatic,” Lachlan Murdoch said. “We reported those allegations, which I believe were incredibly newsworthy. So we did not make an apology for reporting the sitting president’s allegations about a voting system.”
Smartmatic was indicted by the Department of Justice last month as part of an investigation into bribery in the Philippines. The company denies the charges, calling the indictment “targeted, political, and unjust”.
Fox News has strenuously denied Smartmatic’s claims and said the company has vastly overstated its value.
“The evidence shows that Smartmatic’s business and reputation were badly suffering long before any claims by President Trump’s lawyers on Fox News and that Smartmatic grossly inflated its damage claims to generate headlines and chill free speech,” a Fox News spokesperson said. “Now, in the aftermath of Smartmatic being criminally charged with bribery in the Philippines and the Government’s motion to include evidence of Smartmatic’s business dealings in Venezuela and Los Angeles County, we are eager and ready to continue defending our press freedoms.”
Fox had petitioned the judge in the case to delay the trial, pending the criminal case against Smartmatic, but on Monday that effort was denied.
“Today’s decision is an important victory for Smartmatic as we progress in our efforts to hold Fox accountable for its lies,” a Smartmatic spokesperson said. “The court made clear that Fox’s attempts to delay accountability won’t work, and its day of reckoning is coming.”
Both parties are tentatively scheduled to argue their case for summary judgement next month.
