Speaker 1: Today, I'm starting with explosive and stunning revelations from the Dominion
lawsuit against Fox News. We have learned in the last few hours that Rupert Murdoch of News Corp
admitted under oath that, yes, Fox News hosts were promoting election lies. Now, we all knew this,
but it is a massive story of huge consequence. Yeah, Rupert Murdoch can afford to pay, most
likely whatever comes of this lawsuit. But this genuinely could could harm Fox News in a serious
way. Let's get right to what we've learned. Media Aid has a report. Rupert Murdoch admitted under
oath. Fox News hosts promoted election lies on air despite a raft of evidence revealing that
many hosts privately knew that the claims made by then-President Donald Trump and his surrogates
were false. Stunning new details emerged in more court documents released yesterday afternoon
in the Dominion voting system. Defamation lawsuit against Fox News. As chairman of Fox News parent
company of Fox Corporation, Murdoch is a central figure in the $1.6 billion damages claim,
according to the copy of the filing obtained by Media eight. Murdoch admitted in a deposition last
month that false election claims were promoted by top hosts at the Cable News Network. Quote,
They endorsed. I would have liked us to be stronger in denouncing it in hindsight,
said Murdoch. Murdoch was asked if host Jeanine Pirro endorsed the claims. Murdoch said,
I think so. He said Lou Dobbs endorsed the claims, quote, a lot. And Sean HANNITY did so a bit.
When asked if he could have told Fox to stop inviting Trump lawyers Sidney Powell and Rudy
Giuliani on the air. Murdoch replied, I could have, but I didn't. Arguably,
as big a revelation, Murdoch helped the Trump campaign by providing Biden television ads to
Jared Kushner before they ran on Fox News. These are massive revelations. Keep in mind that Fox
News hosted a presidential debate in 2020 as if they were some kind of neutral observer or
arbiter. But behind the scenes, look at what was going on. Yahoo News via Bloomberg. Also with an
interesting article worth looking at, Murdoch testified Fox Commentators Endorse Trump's 2020
Election lie. Fox News Fox Corporation chairman Rupert Murdoch testified that Fox's popular
commentators endorsed that's the word he used, endorsed Trump's false claim that the 2020
election was rigged. Even though Murdoch said he doubted it right away, he doubted it right away.
There's an interesting transcript here where it says Murdoch testified that he doubted Trump's
conspiracy theory right away. Is it is it. It is fair to say you seriously doubted any claim
of massive election fraud. Murdoch was asked by a lawyer. Oh, yeah, Murdoch said. And you
seriously doubted it from the beginning? He was asked. Yeah. Murdoch replied. I mean, we thought
everything was on the up and up. I think that was shown when we announced Arizona, of course,
referring to when Fox declared Biden the winner of Arizona. This is an incredible media story. And,
you know, whatever you think of of the sort of gossip world, there was that very big Hulk Hogan
case involving because I didn't follow it, I don't even know which tabloid it was. And he essentially
put them out of business. And there was sort of like, do you care about Hulk Hogan? But then there
was. What does this mean more generally about the caution that media outlets have to have? And this
could be a significantly more consequential story. Now, there's a couple of different things that I
think are important to mention. It would be really great. If this seriously damaged Fox News. As far
as the broadcast side. Now, that's not because I want to suppress speech. It's not because I
want to violate anyone's First Amendment rights. It's because actions should have consequences.
And one of the things that I've said before is that the bigger your platform, the more
seriously you should take your responsibility for what you put out on air and the more you should
want to be accurate in what you say. And even as it applies to my program. Now that the show
is as big as it is, which is still way smaller than these other platforms we're talking about.
I am extra careful when it comes to making sure that I'm getting as close to the truth,
always on the program when it comes to the facts that I'm presenting, then I give my opinion. Sure.
It's not that I didn't care about it when the show was smaller. But I sense the responsibility,
and I know that the repercussions for getting even minor details wrong are greater. The larger
you are. Fox News as one of the three biggest cable news networks. And I know people say,
David, it's not really news. I know, but we're colloquially we're talking about the three
biggest cable news networks, MSNBC, CNN, Fox News. They not accidentally but knowingly spent months
promoting claims about the election that they knew to be lies, the result of which was, I don't want
to say irreversibly corrosive to our democracy, but it has still damaged our democracy to this
day as we continue to see these claims being made. Now, as far as the impact the lawsuit is likely
to have on Fox News, even if they deserve for it to be very damaging, they will continue to lie.
They will continue to monetize by playing to the lowest common denominator of the American right
wing, even if on a personal level. HANNITY and Ingram and Tucker and Rupert Murdoch all know
that they're saying things that aren't true and that they're inviting guests on to say things
that aren't true, as Tucker Carlson knew about Sidney Powell, the money part of it. You know,
Rupert Murdoch can probably afford whatever comes of this is the reality. His goal now is
to minimize the damage to the platform. And it remains to be seen where this goes. But
an extraordinary revelation. And my guess is we are going to learn even more in the days to come