On Tuesday, Fox News avoided a lengthy, potentially embarrassing trial in the defamation lawsuit brought against it by Dominion Voting Systems, when the network agreed to pay Dominion $787 million. And Tuesday night on CBS’ “The Late Show,” Stephen Colbert admitted he considers the case’s outcome to be a huge disappoint.
Partly because he “wanted to see Rupert Murdoch put his hand on the bible and burst into flames.” But Colbert had a more serious concern. The settlement, which doesn’t require Fox to apologize, or even admit to any wrongdoing, “does nothing for our democracy.”
“ About two hours ago, Fox News settled their defamation suit with Dominion Voting Systems, averting a trial,” Colbert said during his monologue. “Dammit. I want my trial. I want it. You were supposed to provide me six weeks of delicious content. I wanted to see Rupert Murdoch put his hand on the Bible and burst into flames.”
“According to Dominion, the settlement was for our gargantuan 787.5 million,” Colbert continued. “That’s a lot of Dough-minion. Admittedly, Rupert Murdoch is losing his shirt here, but nobody wanted to see that.”
“And I got some bad news. I got some bad news folks, because reportedly Fox News will not have to acknowledge on air, that it told lies about dominion in the wake of the 2020 election,” Colbert said as the audience began booing loudly.
“Boo, what they said. Boo boo. Sir, Boo, I say. I guess it’s satisfying. I mean, for Dominion, that Rupee had to fork over a pile of cash, but that does nothing for our democracy. What we need is Fox News personalities to look straight into the camera, admit that they lied over and over again about the 2020 election, and then hurl themselves into Mount Doom,” Colbert added.
Then Colbert brought up one of the more amusing things to come out of the settlement.
“Fox was quick to release a statement, semi-acknowledging that something kind of sort of maybe happened. It said… You know what?” Colbert said, pausing. “I’ll let our friend Jake Tapper attempt to read it.”
Colbert then played a clip from CNN in which Tapper read the part of the statement where Fox claimed that the settlement “reflects Fox’s continued commitment to the highest journalistic standards.” Tapper of course couldn’t keep a straight face while doing so, and ended up apologizing for laughing about it.
“Oh, don’t, don’t apologize, Jake. It’s hilarious,” Colbert said in response.
Watch the whole clip above now.