By David Bauder and Nicholas Riccardi | Related Press
NEW YORK — A defamation lawsuit is revealing scornful behind-the-scenes opinions by Fox Information figures about Donald Trump, together with a Tucker Carlson textual content message declaring “I hate him passionately.”
Carlson’s non-public textual content dialog was revealed in court docket papers at just about the identical time that the previous president was hailing the Fox Information host on social media. Trump stated he was doing a “nice job” in presenting excerpts of U.S. Capitol safety video of the Jan. 6, 2021, revolt — although Carlson used the video to supply a false narrative of the assault.
The paperwork are additionally coming to mild at a time of elevated stress between Trump and the dominant media power interesting to conservatives as he campaigns to regain the presidency.
Voting machine producer Dominion Voting Techniques is suing Fox Information for $1.6 billion, claiming the community broadcast false claims that the corporate was liable for fraud within the 2020 presidential election. The case is to go to trial this spring, and a trove of paperwork associated to Fox’s actions after the election are being publicly launched prematurely.
A standard theme rising from the inner paperwork and depositions is that Fox executives and hosts doubted the election claims being peddled by Trump and his allies, however aired and emphasised them anyway. Fox was rising involved a few decline in viewership as Trump supporters turned away from the community after it — accurately — referred to as Joe Biden the presidential winner in Arizona on election evening.
The exchanges embrace Carlson’s textual content dialog on Jan. 4, 2021, with an unknown particular person, during which the prime-time host expressed anger towards Trump.
Carlson stated that “we're very, very near having the ability to ignore Trump most nights” and that “I actually can’t wait.”
Carlson stated he had little question that there was fraud within the 2020 election, however that Trump and his legal professionals had so discredited their case — and media figures like himself — “that it’s infuriating. Completely enrages me.”
Federal and state officers, courts, exhaustive evaluations in battleground states and Trump’s legal professional basic discovered no widespread fraud that would have modified the result of the 2020 election, though Trump continues to falsely state that the presidency was stolen from him.
Addressing Trump’s 4 years as president, Carlson stated, “We’re all pretending we’ve bought loads to point out for it, as a result of admitting what a catastrophe it’s been is simply too robust to digest. However come on. There actually isn’t an upside to Trump.”
In one other textual content change greater than a month earlier, Carlson denigrated Trump’s enterprise skills: Trump(‘s expertise, he stated, is to “destroy issues. He might simply destroy us if we play it flawed.”
Fox, in response to those and different court docket reveals that have been launched late Tuesday, stated that “Dominion has been caught crimson handed utilizing extra distortions and misinformation of their PR marketing campaign to smear Fox Information and trample on free speech and freedom of the press. We already know they are going to say and do something to attempt to win this case, however to twist and even misattribute quotes to the best ranges of our firm is really past the pale.”
Fox’s founder, Rupert Murdoch, has a fancy relationship with Trump: “I used to be not near him,” Murdoch stated in a deposition within the libel lawsuit.
Certainly, although Murdoch acknowledged speaking to Trump sometimes, he stated he additionally sought inside data from Sean Hannity, one in every of his community’s primetime hosts, as a result of Hannity was the closest particular person at Fox to Trump.
Following Trump’s loss in November of 2020, Murdoch despaired of the president’s conduct.
“The actual hazard is what he may do as president,” Murdoch wrote in an e mail to a buddy that month. “Apparently not sleeping and bouncing off partitions! Don’t find out about Melania, however children no assist.”
However Murdoch informed his community’s officers that he additionally didn’t wish to “antagonize” Trump: “He had a really massive following, and so they have been in all probability largely viewers of Fox, so it could have been silly,” Murdoch stated in a deposition within the Dominion case.
In separate questioning within the case, Murdoch acknowledged that he believed the 2020 presidential election ” was not stolen.”
On social media lately, Trump was crucial of Fox when different court docket papers launched within the Dominion case made clear that quite a lot of the community’s executives and personalities privately believed the election fraud claims have been bunk.
Trump and his group even have accused Fox of giving his newest marketing campaign for the presidency little consideration and favoring a possible challenger for the GOP nomination, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
In a fiery speech on the Conservative Political Motion Committee final week, Trump ally Steve Bannon complained that Fox had disrespected the previous president.
“You’ve deemed Trump’s not going to be president,” Bannon stated. “Properly, we deem you’re not going to have a community.”
On Saturday afternoon. Fox Information aired Trump’s speech to CPAC in its entirety.
Riccardi reported from Denver. Related Press writers Christina A. Cassidy in Atlanta, Jonathan J. Cooper in Phoenix, Gary Fields in Washington and Jennifer Peltz in New York contributed to this report.