As RedState reported, and as writers here predicted, Fox News settled with Dominion Voting Systems for an astronomical $787.5 million on Tuesday. That came after a trial delay on Monday gave the two sides more time to come to an agreement.
The huge settlement was the result of figures going on the network after the 2020 election, accusing Dominion machines of being used to rig the election. That evidence, largely pushed by figures like Sidney Powell, who promised the “Kraken,” never emerged
You’d think nearly a billion dollars in damages would be enough to satiate, but CNN is really, really upset that this ended up not going to trial. Oliver Darcy and Alyson Camerota took to the airwaves in the aftermath and rhetorically shook their fists at the sky.
It feels pretty weird to be dunking on CNN given that Fox News did actually take a massive blow here. $787.5 million is a ton of money, even for a large, national news outlet. Yet, the hosts over on the liberal network are just so absurd that they always manage to outpace reality.
I mean, listen to Darcy. He actually says that going to trial would have been a trial balloon for “democracy.” What does that even mean? This is the United States of America. Even when free speech turns into defamation, it’s not a threat to democracy. To assert that is outright delusional. I do love the “there were a lot of people that wanted this process to take place” line. Those people are at CNN, and Darcy is one of them. For him to play straight news man, as if he’s just speaking for the masses, is laughable.
Camerota isn’t much better, bemoaning that Sean Hannity and Tucker Carlson don’t have to take the stand, delivering CNN red meat for its diminishing viewer base. Fox News did get to skip the public apology, but that’s how most settlements work.
In the end, this was never about settling a dispute for those at CNN. It was about trying to destroy Fox News, the network that constantly dominates CNN in the ratings, as a shortcut to success. Here’s an idea for the liberal network. Instead of constantly trying to get ahead by silencing other networks, how about the executives over at CNN grow a backbone and start firing the overpaid, unpopular hosts that populate the lineup? They could start with Darcy and Camerota. Continuing to just jumble up the schedule, moving the same chess pieces around obviously isn’t working.
As to Fox News itself, I honestly don’t know how much this settlement hurts the network over the long term. Someone would need intimate knowledge of their finances and yearly earnings vs. expenses to even speculate on that. I have little doubt, though, that the leadership at the conservative network is going to crack down, specifically on stolen election claims, going forward. That’s going to make some people upset, but when a company is having to shell out $787 million, feelings go out the window.