Dominion Voting Systems Sues Fox News for $1.6 Billion Over Bogus Election Lies

Last updated on March 28th, 2021 at 06:10 am

Dominion Voting Systems filed a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News, citing the network’s continued news coverage that has spread the baseless claim that the 2020 general election was fraudulent, lies that contributed to the storming of the United States Capitol by a mob of former President Donald Trump’s supporters on January 6.

Dominion argues that Fox News “sold a false story of election fraud in order to serve its own commercial purposes, severely injuring Dominion in the process,” according to a copy of the lawsuit obtained by The Associated Press.

“This was a conscious, knowing business decision to endorse and repeat and broadcast these lies in order to keep its viewership,” said attorney Justin Nelson, of Susman Godfrey.

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“The buck stops with Fox on this,” attorney Stephen Shackelford said. “Fox chose to put this on all of its many platforms. They rebroadcast, republished it on social media and other places.”

The lawsuit is Dominion’s first against a media company. Dominion has sued several individuals for their lies about the election, including former President Donald Trump’s attorney, Rudy Giuliani, and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell.

The claim that Dominion voting machines were compromised in some way has already been debunked.  A statement posted last month by the federal Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), part of a joint statement from the Election Infrastructure Government Coordinating Council and the Election Infrastructure Sector Coordinating Executive Committees, revealed the agencies found “no evidence that any voting system deleted or lost votes, changed votes, or was in any way compromised.” The statement went on to refer to the 2020 general election as “the most secure in American history.” 

These facts did not stop former President Trump from urging his Twitter followers to watch a broadcast from Fox News host Sean Hannity that gave still more air time to the Dominion conspiracy theory, which originated from the pro-Trump One America News Network (OANN).

OANN claimed, citing “data analysis” and without providing any clear evidence, that Dominion “deleted 2.7 million Trump votes nationwide.” A New York Times investigation found that there were explanations for voting irregularities in cases in Michigan and Georgia that involved Dominion software.

Alan Herrera

Alan is a writer, editor, and news junkie based in New York.