Topline
Fox Corp. CEO Lachlan Murdoch has dropped his defamation suit against the publisher of Australian news website Crikey, which published a piece partly blaming the Murdoch family for the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, just days after Fox agreed to pay $787.5 million to settle a defamation case brought against it by Dominion Voting Systems.
File Photo: Fox Corp. CEO Lachlan Murdoch (right) with Fox Corp. Executive Chairman Rupert Murdoch.
Key Facts
In a filing made with the Federal Court of Australia, Murdoch’s lawyers noted their client “discontinues the whole of the proceedings,” against Crikey’s publisher Private Media.
In a statement issued on Twitter, Private Media CEO Will Hayward called the development a “substantial victory for legitimate public interest journalism.”
Murdoch had sued Private Media last year after Crikey published an opinion piece referring to the Murdoch family as an “unindicted co-conspirator” in the January 6 riots.
In his statement, Hayward added that his company stands by “what we published last June.”
Marque Lawyers, which represented Private Media in the case, tweeted that the Fox CEO will be “up for Crikey’s legal costs.”
Key Background
Murdoch’s defamation suit was in response to an op-ed about the January 6 hearings published by Crikey in June last year, which referred to the Murdochs and “their slew of poisonous Fox News commentators” as the “unindicted co-conspirators of this continuing crisis.” The Fox Corp. CEO argued that the piece had “gravely injured” his character and reputation. In a response filed earlier this month, Private Media cited revelations made in the Dominion case filings. The publisher called Murdoch “morally and ethically culpable for the illegal January 6 attack” because under his control, Fox News “promoted and peddled Trump’s lie of the stolen election.” The filing also called out Murdoch’s “unethical and reprehensible conduct” for allowing the network to promote something he knew was false.
News Peg
Earlier this week, Dominion Voting Systems agreed to settle its defamation case against Fox News after the network agreed to pay the electronic voting machine maker $787.5 million. The settlement allowed Fox to avoid a high-profile weeks-long trial where its top on-air personalities and executives may have been called on to testify. Dominion had sued Fox News and its parent Fox Corp. for defamation in 2021, seeking damages totaling $1.6 billion, accusing the network of pushing false claims about its voting machines altering the results of the 2020 presidential elections. The voting machines maker argued that Fox was aware the claims were false but chose to air them anyway to boost viewership and profits. Filings made in the case included internal communications at the network and it showed several top anchors and executives were skeptical about the election fraud theories despite pushing them on air.
Crucial Quote
“We stand by our position that Lachlan Murdoch was culpable in promoting the lie of the 2020 election result because he, and his father, had the power to stop the lies. How do we know? Because Dominion sued Fox News for promoting the lies and Fox just paid [AUD] $1.17 billion to Dominion to settle the case,” Hayward said in his statement.
Further Reading
Lachlan Murdoch drops defamation case against Crikey (Crikey)
Source: https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2023/04/21/lachlan-murdoch-drops-defamation-suit-against-australian-publisher-days-after-fox-dominion-settlement/