Rupert Murdoch admits that Fox News hosts backed Trump’s claims that the election was stolen

Fox Corporation Chairman Rupert Murdoch has admitted that some of his Fox News hosts ‘endorsed’ false claims that the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump in his statement in the $1.6 billion lawsuit filed by Dominion Voting Systems.

Murdoch denied that Fox as a network endorsed the claims, but admitted that a collection of its hosts shared the “stolen election lies,” according to a transcript of the billionaire’s sworn testimony from last month.

“They backed it up,” Murdoch said of hosts Jeanine Pirro, Sean Hannity, Lou Dobbs and Maria Bartiromo. He said former presenter Dobbs did ‘a lot’ and Hannity did ‘a little’.

“I wish we were stronger in calling it out with hindsight,” Murdoch added.

Dominion alleged that Fox aired comments made by Trump-affiliated lawyers Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani that smeared the voting company.

A Fox News spokeswoman called Dominion’s argument in the filing “an extreme and unsupported view of defamation law that would prevent journalists from doing basic reporting.”

“They supported,” Murdoch said of hosts Jeanine Pirro, above, Sean Hannity, Lou Dobbs and Maria Bartiromo.

Fox airs a segment to counter earlier comments made by its conservative hosts and pro-Trump guests that voting software firm Smartmatic was involved in voter fraud.

The representative also claimed that the company is “selecting sound bites, omitting key context, and mischaracterizing the record.”

In his statement, Murdoch also said that hosts who knew they were promoting lies should be “reprimanded, perhaps removed.”

He did not say that host Tucker Carlson endorsed voter fraud, though he did say it was “wrong” for Carlson to have My Pillow CEO Mike Lindell on January 26, 2021 to make false accusations against Dominion without denying them.

In a statement to DailyMail.com, a Fox spokeswoman said: “The Dominion lawsuit has always been more focused on what will generate headlines than what can stand up to legal and factual scrutiny, as illustrated by the fact that it is now forced to reduce their outlandish damages claim by more than half a billion dollars after their implausible claims were debunked by their own expert.

“Your motion for summary judgment took an extreme and baseless view of libel law that would prevent journalists from doing basic reporting and your efforts to publicly smear FOX for covering and commenting on the allegations of a sitting President of the United States should to be recognized for what they are: a flagrant violation of the First Amendment.

They also pointed to an example of Dominion’s lawyers saying it would be “unthinkable that a competent plaintiff’s lawyer would advise a client to sue CBS, FOX or CNN over the live broadcast of defamatory comments made by, say, President Trump.”

In the filing released Monday, they also denied that Murdoch was directly involved in covering the allegations of voter fraud.

Murdoch’s comments came as court documents unsealed earlier this month showed Fox News anchors expressing doubt about the voter fraud claims they were presenting to viewers.

“Sidney Powell is lying” about having proof of voter fraud, Tucker Carlson told a producer about the lawyer in a Nov. 16, 2020 message, according to an excerpt from an exhibit that remains sealed.

Carlson also referred to Powell in a text as an “unguided missile” and “dangerous as hell.” Meanwhile, host Laura Ingraham told Carlson that Powell is “a complete nutcase.” No one will work with her. Same with Rudy’, referring to former New York mayor and Trump supporter Rudy Giuliani.

Meanwhile, Sean Hannity said in a statement that “that whole narrative that Sidney was pushing, I didn’t believe it for a second,” according to the Dominion filing.

Denver-based Dominion, which sells electronic voting hardware and software, is suing both Fox News and parent company Fox Corporation.

Dominion said some Fox News employees deliberately amplified false claims that Dominion had shifted votes in the 2020 election and that Fox provided a platform for guests to make false and defamatory statements.

Rupert Murdoch, left, pictured with Trump in 2016

Dominion alleged that Fox aired comments made by Trump-affiliated lawyers Sidney Powell and Rudy Giuliani that smeared the voting company.

Documents unsealed today and on February 17 show that top executives and on-air anchors considered the claims made by the Trump team dubious at the time, but aired them anyway without fact-checking.

One of the various Dominion conspiracies peddled online was that a secret algorithm in its machines allowed votes to be shifted from one candidate to another, and that the company was founded in Venezuela to help that country’s leader, Hugo Chávez, fix the elections.

Dominion’s most recent filing also shows how former Chairman Paul Ryan, now a Fox Corp. board member, said in his statement that he told Murdoch and his son and Fox Corp CEO Lachlan Murdoch, “Fox News You shouldn’t spread conspiracy theories.”

Asked by Dominion attorney Justin Nelson if Murdoch Sr., as company president, could have told the hosts to keep Powell and Giuliani off the air, he said: “I could have, but I didn’t.”

Fox’s lawyers have pointed to times when their hosts rejected fraud claims made by Powell and Giuliani.

Murdoch also admitted that he doubted the claims from the start.

“I mean, we thought everything was on,” he said in his statement. “I think that was demonstrated when we announced Arizona,” referring to when Fox was the first network to call the presidential race in Arizona in favor of Joe Biden.

But Murdoch admitted he had a “long conversation” with his son Lachlan and Fox News executive Suzanne Scott about “the direction Fox should go” after some longtime viewers rejected Arizona’s call.

Fox’s lawyers warn that threatening the company with a $1.6 billion judgment will make other news outlets think twice about what they report. They also say that the documents produced in the lawsuit show that Dominion has not suffered any financial damage and do not indicate that it has lost customers as a result of Fox’s election coverage.

Superior Court Judge Eric Davis is scheduled to preside over a trial that begins in mid-April, but granting summary judgment to either side would avoid the need for a jury trial that could drag on for five weeks.