Dominion came away the monetary victor in the company’s defamation settlement with Fox News, but the cable TV network’s statement “acknowledging certain claims about Dominion to be false” has left much to be desired from those who wanted to see Fox admit to lying about the 2020 election results on air.
When questioned on Wednesday by “Good Morning America” co-anchor George Stephanopoulos, who noted that “what you didn’t get was an apology,” Dominion CEO John Poulos admitted the statement that Fox News put out was not what he wrote.
“There was an acknowledgment, and certainly it was not the way I wrote it. I had some conversations with my team, my co-founder and I, and at the end of the day, the court system is really about accountability. We feel we got it. All of the facts that we discovered during the case had come to light.”
When Stephanopoulos pointed out that Fox News just acknowledged the court’s ruling instead of admitting lies, Poulos pointed to the court documents.
“Well, if you look at the documents, I think they speak for themselves. They did acknowledge they did not argue falsity. And the motion for summary judgment was extremely clear, in fact, you actually use the language crystal clear.”
The precise language in Fox News’ statement reads, “We acknowledge the Court’s rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false,” and further rankling those who were hoping to see some admission of guilt is the fact that Fox News has no obligation to admit to lies or even acknowledge these rulings on air. Their near-total blackout of coverage of the defamation trial on Fox News airwaves will seemingly include the outcome of the trial itself, save for a brief mention by Howard Kurtz shortly after the ruling on Tuesday.
“For us, it was never really about Fox, per se,” Poulos told Stephanopoulos. “It was about telling the truth — the media telling the truth. I think that what was important for us is for people to be held accountable for when they recklessly and knowingly tell lies that have such devastating consequences.”
