NYC, Oregon Pension Funds accuse Fox of lying
Lawsuit alleges media giant allowed its Fox News station to broadcast misleading information about the 2020 election
NEW YORK – New York City and Oregon state pension funds have filed a lawsuit against Fox Corporation.
The lawsuit alleges the media giant allowed its Fox News station to broadcast misleading information about the 2020 election.
As a result, they say, shareholders’ investments have been jeopardized.
The lawsuit, filed in the Delaware Court of Chancery, represents a significant shareholder push against Fox since the company paid a record $787.5 million in a defamation settlement with Dominion Voting Systems earlier this year.
After the 2020 election, Fox News hosts and guests repeatedly claimed that former President Donald Trump won.
They also promoted conspiracy theories supporting that claim, such as the allegation that Dominion’s voting machines skewed the votes in favor of President Joe Biden.
At the end of July, New York City pension funds held $28.1 million worth of Fox Corporation stock, and Oregon stock totaled $5.2 million at the end of August.
“Fox’s board of directors has blatantly disregarded the need for journalistic standards and failed to put safeguards in place despite having a business model that invites defamation litigation,” Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum said in a statement.
“The directors’ choices exposed themselves and the company to liability and exposed their shareholders to significant risks. That is the crux of our lawsuit, and we look forward to making our case in court.”
Experts had previously warned Fox that the company was vulnerable to such lawsuits because of its dissemination of potentially defamatory falsehoods.
Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum stressed that Fox directors were taking significant risks by spreading known falsehoods for profit.
Fox faces more defamation lawsuits, notably a $2.7 billion suit by Smartmatic and another related to conspiracy theories surrounding the Jan. 6 riots at the Capitol.
The Media and Democracy Project recently petitioned the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to revoke the broadcast license for FOX 29 Philadelphia.
Media specialists Steve Macek and Mitchell Szczepanczyk support this move, believing that Fox’s track record justifies such punitive measures.
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