Rupert Murdoch is expected to be called as a witness in the Fox News vs. Dominion trial

Fox Corporation Chairman Rupert Murdoch will take the stand in the billion-dollar defamation lawsuit brought by Dominion Voting Systems against Fox News.

The company accuses the network of harming its business by spreading false information about the 2020 presidential election.

According to Bloomberg, who first reported the news, the 92-year-old’s appearance could come as soon as Monday. The report said Murdoch will likely be the first or second witness called by the prosecution. Jury selection for the trial begins Thursday.

Last week, Delaware Supreme Court Justice Eric Davis said he would not stop Dominion from calling Murdoch to personally testify about his involvement in the reporting, which Davis said was false and defamatory.

The case will be one of the most closely watched American defamation cases in decades. The jury will decide whether to pay Fox News Dominion Voting Systems $1.6 billion for spreading voter fraud.

Dominion claims Fox top executives approved the coverage, but the network says evidence of high-level involvement is worn out

The jury will be drawn from New Castle County, Delaware, where Democrats outnumber Republicans by more than two to one, according to the U.S. Department of Elections.

A critical task for jurors during the five-week trial will be to decide who was responsible for the cable network’s decision to air the allegations, despite internal doubts about their veracity.

Dominion claims Fox’s top executives approved the coverage, but the network says evidence of high-level involvement has worn off.

Dominion alleges that Fox destroyed his company by knowingly spreading false claims that its ballot counting machines were used to reverse the results of the 2020 U.S. presidential election against former President Donald Trump, a Republican who lost to Democrat Joe Biden.

The trial is widely viewed as a test to see whether Fox’s reporting crossed the line between ethical journalism and the careless pursuit of ratings, as Dominion alleges and Fox denies.

Opening arguments begin on April 17.

They will come weeks after Davis setback Fox by ruling that allegations the network aired about Dominion’s complicity in a nonexistent plot to rig the election against Trump are not protected by the First Amendment of the US Constitution. which forms the basis of the law on freedom of expression. .

But Davis left it to jurors to decide whether Fox knowingly spread false information or acted with a reckless disregard for the truth – the legal standard of actual malice that Dominion must meet in order to prevail.

Fox said it just contained very newsworthy allegations. The coverage fueled an ecosystem of misinformation about Trump’s loss in 2020 that has persisted ever since

A voting machine company’s defamation case against Fox News for broadcasting false accusations about the 2020 presidential election will go to trial

The question could hinge on a wealth of internal Fox communications and testimony from Murdoch, his son Lachlan, and a parade of Fox dignitaries and hosts expected to testify.

The defamatory statements aired on shows like Sunday Morning Futures, Lou Dobbs Tonight, and Justice with Judge Jeanine.

Dominion claims that Fox staff from the newsroom to the boardroom knew the statements were false, but continued to broadcast to avoid losing viewers to far-right media outlets.

Dominion also cites evidence that some hosts and producers believed the guests they distributed, including former Trump attorneys Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, lacked credibility.

Fox has argued that Dominion fails to actually malign the individuals responsible for the defamatory statements because it cannot prove that a “superior official” at the network or its parent company ordered, participated in, or endorsed wrongdoing .

The network says scattered doubts about certain individuals’ claims cannot be attributed to the organization as a whole.