From 2h ago
Dominion Voting Systems has reached a settlement in its $1.6bn defamation lawsuit against Fox News, the Guardian has confirmed.
We will post more details as they come in.
Representative Cori Bush has joined in calls for for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas to be impeached, following reports that the justice did not disclose his financial dealings with Republican donor and real estate developer Harlan Crow.
Bush said:
It is clear that Justice Thomas holds a complete disregard for law and ethics that is incompatible with the trust and confidence placed in federal judges. For these reasons, and because the federal judiciary has failed to hold Justice Thomas accountable, I am calling for impeachment proceedings to begin regarding Justice Thomas’s apparent violations of federal law.
Holding judges accountable for their behavior is a matter of life-or-death for our communities. They wield enormous power, and the current hands-off approach to the judiciary has only emboldened lawless, corrupt, far-right judges to strip away our rights and make our lives worse off.
Fox won’t have to acknowledge that it lied about Dominion on air, according to CNN media reporter Oliver Darcy.
Although Fox acknowledged, in a circuitous statement, “the Court’s rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false”, Fox News hosts won’t have to admit to lying to its viewers, or directly take accountability for spreading false information.
Reuters reports that Fox shareholders are seeking records to review executives’ oversight of Fox News’ coverage of Donald Trump’s election claims.
From Reuters:
Fox Corp shareholders are demanding company records that may show whether directors and executives properly oversaw Fox News’ coverage of former President Donald Trump’s election-rigging claims, sources told Reuters, in what could be a prelude to lawsuits seeking to make directors liable for costs.
Investors are using provisions in Delaware corporate law to demand internal Fox records to investigate how Fox’s leaders acted as its Fox News network aired segments on Trump’s false claims that he lost the 2020 presidential election due to voter fraud, two sources confirmed.
In moves not previously reported, shareholders are looking for records such as board minutes, emails and texts that may contain evidence that Fox directors and executives were derelict by allowing the network to air the false claims.
And here’s a longer statement from John Poulos, Dominion’s CEO:
Fox has admitted to telling lies about Dominion that caused enormous damage to my company, our employees, and our customers.
Nothing can ever make up for that.
Throughout this process, we have sought accountability, and believe the evidence brought to light through this case underscores the consequences of spreading and endorsing lies.
Truthful reporting in the media is essential to our democracy. Dominion, our employees and our partners are grateful to the court for allowing the process for the truth to come out.
In a statement addressing the settlement, Fox News acknowledged the falsehoods aired on the network, without going much further to take accountability.
The statement reads:
We are pleased to have reached a settlement of our dispute with Dominion Voting Systems. We acknowledge the Court’s rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false. This settlement reflects FOX’s continued commitment to the highest journalistic standards. We are hopeful that our decision to resolve this dispute with Dominion amicably, instead of the acrimony of a divisive trial, allows the country to move forward from these issues.
“The truth matters. Lies have consequences,” said Dominion lawyer Justin Nelson, noting that the $787.5m settlement with Fox News represents accountability.
“Fox has admitted to telling lies about Dominion,” said Dominion CEO John Poulos.
Even though Fox ultimately settled its $1.6bn defamation lawsuit against Dominion, “The stain this leaves on Fox can’t be wiped out with money,” Angelo Carusone, the president of Media Matters for America, a media watchdog group, said in a statement.
“Fox News lied about the 2020 election; they all knew it was a lie, right up to the Murdochs themselves. What the Dominion trial offered was a keyhole view into the day-to-day industrial-scale deceit that takes place at Fox. It helped illustrate why the company is such a uniquely destructive force.”
The settlement in Dominion Voting Systems’s defamation lawsuit against Fox News came just as opening arguments were to begin in the trial, which was being held in Wilmington, Delaware.
A jury had been seated earlier today, and opening arguments were expected this afternoon, before being delayed without explanation – until now.
Dominion was seeking $1.6bn in compensation from Fox, alleging the broadcaster knowingly defamed it with reports that baselessly claimed the elections firm rigged the 2020 election against Donald Trump.
Dominion Voting Systems has reached a settlement in its $1.6bn defamation lawsuit against Fox News, the Guardian has confirmed.
We will post more details as they come in.
Speaking at the White House earlier today, Joe Biden cast Republican House speaker Kevin McCarthy’s rhetoric on the debt ceiling as irresponsible. Here’s a clip of his comments:
The two men are at loggerheads over the issue, which could pose a grievous threat to the health of the world’s largest economy. Biden wants to increase the borrowing limit without preconditions, while McCarthy wants the president and his Democratic allies to agree to spending cuts, arguing that the country’s budget deficit is out of control.
Meanwhile, White House deputy press secretary Andrew Bates condemned rightwing House Republicans who want to see the Inflation Reduction Act dismantled. Here’s a statement he shared with the Guardian:
By targeting the Inflation Reduction Act, Scott Perry and Chip Roy just showed the real agenda of the ultra MAGA hardliners who increasingly dominate the House Republican Conference. Not only are House Republicans threatening to hold Americans’ jobs and retirement savings hostage by engaging in the dangerous brinkmanship that Presidents Reagan and Trump warned against. Now, the increasingly empowered extreme MAGA Republicans want their ransom to be killing tens of thousands of manufacturing jobs in a windfall for China, raising prescription drug and energy costs for middle class families, and sending the deficit skyward – all in the name of sweetheart deals for rich special interests. That’s on top of a multitude of other tax handouts they’re seeking for big corporations and the wealthy. Like even Donald Trump said in 2019, avoiding a catastrophic and unprecedented default is non-negotiable. And threatening default to sell working people out to Big Pharma and billionaires is incredibly revealing.”
The judge in Dominion Voting Systems’s lawsuit against Fox News has appointed a special master to ensure Fox News turned over all evidence in the case, the Washington Post reports:
Jury selection in the case concluded earlier today, and opening arguments were expected to begin afterward, but have been delayed without explanation.
Dominion is seeking $1.6bn in compensation from Fox, arguing the conservative network harmed its business by falsely told its viewers the company was involved in rigging the 2020 election.
It seems unlikely we’ll hear full opening arguments this afternoon, if we hear anything at all.
There has been an unexplained delay since lunch. Both sides earlier told Judge Eric Davis they had planned more than an hour opening arguments and court is scheduled to end today at 4.30pm. The trial had already been pushed back a day.
The outlines of what rightwing House Republicans want in exchange for increasing the debt ceiling are becoming clear.
CNN reports that Scott Perry, leader of the Freedom Caucus that includes some of the House’s most conservative lawmakers, wants to repeal the Inflation Reduction Act – Joe Biden’s signature legislative achievement that also includes the strongest measures Congress has ever enacted against climate change:
Confusion is rampant in the packed courtroom, as opening statements were scheduled to start at 1.30pm after a lunch break, but still have not kicked off as of 2.40pm.
Court staff said they could not explain the delay. Attorneys for Fox and Dominion appeared to huddle with each other at least once, and the judge and jurors have not been seated.
Each party’s opening statement is supposed to last around 90 minutes. With a 4.30pm recess today, there is no longer time for both parties to preview their evidence.
“As an update, I don’t have an update,” a court staffer said to the overflow room of journalists, resulting in many laughs.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, one of the best known progressive Democrats in the House, has again condemned supreme court justice Clarence Thomas for his ties to a Republican mega donor.
Thomas is a conservative stalwart on the court, but in recent days ProPublica revealed he had accepted luxury trips as well as a real estate deal from Harlan Crow, a deep-pocketed GOP supporter.
Here’s what Ocasio-Cortez had to say about that:
Senate Democrats have also demanded the supreme court investigate Thomas’s ties.
We’re waiting for the opening arguments in the trial of Dominion Voting Systems’s defamation suit against Fox News, which is expected to start later this afternoon in Wilmington, Delaware, after the jury was seated this morning. Back in Washington, House Republicans are said to be nearing a vote on their proposal for raising the debt ceiling, but its chances of passage are uncertain.
Here’s what else is happening today:
Senate Republicans have shown no inclination in helping Democrats replace ailing senator Dianne Feinstein on the judiciary committee.
Joe Biden spoke last night with Ralph Yarl, the Black teenager shot after ringing the doorbell at the wrong house in Kansas City. Meanwhile, police arrested the alleged shooter following protests over the attack.
Anti-abortion groups have filed their response before the supreme court, which is considering whether to uphold a Texas judge’s ruling taking abortion drug mifepristone off shelves nationwide.
Donald Trump’s finances could take another hit as the author E Jean Carroll’s civil suit alleging defamation heads to trial later this month.
But the Guardian’s Hugo Lowell reports that Trump won’t appear on the witness stand when the proceedings begin:
While abortion foes try to get drugs used in the procedure off the shelves, the Guardian’s Poppy Noor spoke to a New York doctor about a technique that could be used to expand reproductive care access:
Joan Fleischman has always had people flying in from across the world to her private abortion practice in Manhattan. In the two decades her clinic has been open, she has seen clients from places such as Ireland, the Bahamas and Mexico, who couldn’t get abortions in their home countries. In the past year, that has changed. Since the US federal right to abortion was overturned in June last year, she is now more likely to see patients flying in from her own country.
Often they are from Texas, sometimes Ohio, or Florida. Some with links to the city, others with none.
After years of providing abortion care, Fleischman, 60, still finds these trips shocking. “Usually, if somebody needs unusual medical care, they are willing to fly around the world for it – like for advanced neurosurgery or something. It’s always struck me as incredible that people are flying to me for the most simple procedure.”
There’s a reason people fly to see Fleischman. She provides abortions through manual uterine aspiration – using a small, hand-held device to remove pregnancy tissue. The device is gentle enough that the tissue often comes out almost completely intact. It is a quick and discreet procedure where a patient might be in and out of the door in less than an hour.
The anti-abortion groups who convinced a federal judge to order mifepristone off the shelves have asked the supreme court to uphold the rulings, NBC News reports.
The ruling earlier this month by conservative federal judge Matthew Kacsmaryk has been stayed temporarily by the supreme court while it reviews petitions from the Biden administration and a manufacturer of the abortion medication to allow its continued access.
NBC News reports that the groups that originally brought a suit trying to revoke the Food and Drug Administration’s authorization of the pill have formally filed before the supreme court:
The groups, led by the Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, said in a filing that the court should leave in place a ruling last week by the 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals that would suspend several regulatory decisions by the Food and Drug Administration since 2016 that made it easier to obtain the drug.
Lawyers for the groups wrote that the FDA over decades has “stripped away every meaningful and necessary safeguard on chemical abortion, demonstrating callous disregard for women’s well-being, unborn life, and statutory limits”.
They dismissed the government’s “sky-is-falling argument” about the implications of allowing the lower court ruling to go into effect.
“The lower courts’ meticulous decisions do not second-guess the agency’s scientific determinations; they merely re- quire the agency to follow the law,” the lawyers wrote.
Source: US Politics - theguardian.com
