Murdoch said Fox News hosts should say the election is over 'to stop the Trump myth' that it was stolen
- New court documents reveal internal Fox News execs dealing with Trump's election fraud claims.
- In an email, chairman Rupert Murdoch discussed having prime-time anchors acknowledge Biden's win.
New court documents revealed in the Dominion Voting Systems defamation lawsuit against Fox News showed how network executives, including chairman Rupert Murdoch, privately acknowledged its reporters had gone "too far" in supporting the "Trump myth" of election fraud.
In a January 5, 2021 email sent to Suzanne Scott, CEO of Fox News, Murdoch wrote:
"It's been suggested our prime time three should independently or together say something like 'the election is over and Joe Biden won. We are all disappointed, but it happened. We love America and have to turn the page. We will now be the loyal opposition criticizing every liberal mistake the new administration makes. Their declared policies on domestic and foreign policies are naive at best, or worse, retreads of the failed Obama years. And first, let's wear masks and unite to defeat the COVID plague.'"
He added: "Not those words, but a refinement would go a long way to stop the Trump myth that the election stolen. And the basis of his 2024 campaign."
Despite his private acknowledgment that Trump's election fraud claims were a "myth," Murdoch did not require his network to stop circulating the information, instead, he appeared to wonder why other networks were lambasting the conservative outlet.
In another email to Scott, sent on January 21, 2021, Murdoch wrote: "Still getting mud thrown at us! Is it 'unarguable that high profile Fox voices fed the story that the election was stolen and that January 6th an important chance to have result overturned'? Maybe Sean and Lauren went too far. All very well for Sean to tell you he was in despair about Trump but what did he tell viewers?"
In a statement to Insider, representatives for Fox said passages from the filing were taken "wildly out of context" in an attempt to "smear" the network.
"Thanks to today's filings, Dominion has been caught red handed again using more distortions and misinformation in their PR campaign to smear FOX News and trample on free speech and freedom of the press," a Fox spokesperson said in an email to Insider. "We already know they will say and do anything to try to win this case, but to twist and even misattribute quotes to the highest levels of our company is truly beyond the pale."
Murdoch acknowledged in a deposition excerpt — made public last week — that Fox News hosts publicly endorsed the "false notion of a stolen election," while privately trashing Trump, his lawyer Rudy Giuliani, and acknowledging that Joe Biden had won the presidency.
"They all knew. All the way from Rupert Murdoch on down to the show producers, they knew what they were saying was not true, that it was actually a lie. And they did it anyway," Angelo Carusone, president of the watchdog group Media Matters, said in an interview with Democracy Now, adding: "And I feel like, you know, the trail of evidence here is so overwhelming that I think Fox is in some real legal trouble."
Dominion Voting Systems is seeking $1.6 billion in damages over Fox's claims that alleged the company helped rig the 2020 presidential election in favor of Biden.
Representatives Trump did not immediately respond to Insider's requests for comment.