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This has gotta be the most humiliating day for Fox News since the Dominion lawsuit.
Once again, it’s a defamation suit against the network, but this time it’s from the other voting machine company that was made the object of election fraud conspiracy theories in 2020: Smartmatic.
With the firm seeking 2.7 billion dollars in damages over claims that Fox knowingly promoted false voter fraud conspiracy theories in 2020.
And this suit’s been around since 2021, but what’s new this week is that reams of previously redacted documents are now visible.
And they reveal a lot of crazy ass shit, starting with messages that give a glimpse into the network’s anxiety about hemorrhaging viewers after the election.
With the media empire’s founder, Rupert Murdoch, emailing Fox News’ chief executive Suzanne Scott: “Getting creamed by CNN! Guess our viewers don’t want to watch it.”
As well as host Jesse Watters texting a producer, “There’s an audience uprising vs. Fox like I’ve never seen.”
But his producer told him that if Fox called the election for Biden, “you cannot, under any circumstances, cast doubt” on it because “the powers that be are not having any of it.”
With Watters texting then fellow host Pete Hegseth, now the Defense Secretary, the same day asking, “By the way, did you get the memo about not saying fraud?”
Then, a couple of months later, he texted another host, Greg Gutfeld: “Think about how incredible our ratings would be if Fox went ALL in on STOP THE STEAL.”
This even though he testified that he saw “no evidence that Smartmatic Technology switched votes in the 2020 Election in the United States.”
In fact, his colleague Jeanine Pirro said much the same, reportedly testifying that she agreed the election was “fair and free,” that Smartmatic did nothing wrong, and that Biden was “legitimately elected.”
Yet despite that, she reportedly told Sean Hannity she was angry that Fox didn’t air an episode of her show and said:
“I’M TIRED OF THE CENSORSHIP AND I’M EMBARRASSED BY HOW THEY CALLED THIS ELECTION.”
Then, three days later she texted Sidney Powell, Trump’s personal attorney at the time:
“It’s Jeanine P. Got a former CIA chief of station who knows [about] development of Dominion. Keep fighting.”
Meanwhile, her producer warned her, “You should be very careful with this stuff and protect yourself given the ongoing calls for evidence that has not materialized.”
Also, before this next part I should note for context that Fox prohibited on-air personalities from political involvement.
Yet Pirro, who’s now Trump’s U.S. Attorney for D.C., texted then RNC chair Ronna McDaniel before the election:
“I work so hard for the party across the country. I’m the Number 1 watched show on all News cable all weekend. I work so hard for the President and party.”
And in another exchange with Eric Trump, she appeared frustrated that the president hadn’t yet rewarded her loyalty by pardoning her ex husband, who had been convicted for tax evasion and conspiracy.
Though Trump would eventually pardon him just before leaving office.
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Produced by: Cory Ray, Philip DeFranco
Edited by: James Girardier, Maxwell Enright, Julie Goldberg, Christian Meeks, Matthew Henry
Art Department: William Crespo
Writing/Research: Chris Tolve, Philip DeFranco
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#FoxNews #JesseWatters #Politics