Poor result weighed down by lower print and digital advertising at News Corp Australia, a division that includes flagship newspaper The Australian

Jonathan Barrett@barrett_ink Thu 10 Aug 2023

Meet the Press Blog

From the journalists at NBC News and the NBC News Political Unit

 

 

 

 

It’s been growing so fast. My son Lachlan bought that. He bought the first 44% in 2001 for $1 million.

Are you serious?

Yes. And some free publicity. And it cost us about $100 million to buy the next 18%. Now we’ve got 60-odd percent. And it’s got a market cap of $7 billion Australian [$6.5 billion U.S.]. It’s got huge viewership. People go to it just to look at how other people live in houses. And some of them say, “Oh, perhaps I’ll buy that.” If you talk to any agent in Australia, they’ll say that over 90% of their business comes from REA, which of course has devastated the classified advertising in some of our newspapers.

What’s the lesson? And is Realestate.com.au replicable?

We’re looking at expanding REA a lot outside Australia. We’ve looked at all the companies in America that stand out: Zillow and Trulia and so on. And we’ve thought they were overpriced.

News Corp. began expanding into the TV and movie businesses in the mid-1980s. Today 21st Century Fox, the holding company for those assets, has a market cap more than seven times as large as Murdoch’s once-core newspaper business.

News Corp. owns a successful Australian business called Realestate.com.au that many of our readers have probably never heard of.

It’s been growing so fast. My son Lachlan bought that. He bought the first 44% in 2001 for $1 million.

Are you serious?

Yes. And some free publicity. And it cost us about $100 million to buy the next 18%. Now we’ve got 60-odd percent. And it’s got a market cap of $7 billion Australian [$6.5 billion U.S.]. It’s got huge viewership. People go to it just to look at how other people live in houses. And some of them say, “Oh, perhaps I’ll buy that.” If you talk to any agent in Australia, they’ll say that over 90% of their business comes from REA, which of course has devastated the classified advertising in some of our newspapers.

What’s the lesson? And is Realestate.com.au replicable?

We’re looking at expanding REA a lot outside Australia. We’ve looked at all the companies in America that stand out: Zillow and Trulia and so on. And we’ve thought they were overpriced.

News Corp. began expanding into the TV and movie businesses in the mid-1980s. Today 21st Century Fox, the holding company for those assets, has a market cap more than seven times as large as Murdoch’s once-core newspaper business.

Let’s talk about 21st Century Fox.

The film company is doing very well, and of course it’s got a bonus now with the Netflixes and the Amazons coming in buying programs. We plan to step up our production of major films. We’ve got on our plate one or two or maybe more sequels to Avatar, which was the biggest film in history.

I knew about one. There may be two sequels?

The end of ’16 is the first sequel. If we make it, it will be the first time Jim Cameron’s been on time or on budget. But he’s never lost me. When he finally comes through, they’re just huge hits.

Are you going to hire [DreamWorks CEO] Stacey Snider?

I would like to. I’m a great admirer of hers. And I’ve had long talks with her. I think they’re at a stage — it would be improper to talk more about that. It’s really for [Fox Studio chief] Jim Gianopulos to hire her.

Your new Fox Sports 1 network is a very big bet.

Well, it’s a pretty big bet. We certainly expect to lose a couple hundred million dollars for a year or two, and then we expect it to turn, and we’ll gradually make it into a major alternative to ESPN. We’re not going to put ESPN out of business.

Why does ESPN need an alternative?

I think the public deserves choice.

Why?

ESPN is a very, very good operation, and it’s a gold mine. It’s an even bigger gold mine than Fox News. Not that Fox News won’t get there. Fox News is going to make over $1 billion this year, and can do a lot better. No cable company in the world is going to drop it unless they want their houses burned down. [Laughter.] But ESPN has managed to ride this Monday Night Football to the point where they’re charging every home in America with cable. Over $5 a head. How many people watch ESPN? A third of the public, half the public?

21st Century Fox sold its 47% stake in STAR China TV in January. Why bail on China? Is this coincidental with your divorce?

No. We had a couple of channels in China, which were making nothing. And to our happiness and surprise, they were valued at a couple hundred million by Shanghai Media Capital. They took 52% and made it profitable. And then they took up their option to buy us out of the other half.

But is it fair to say that you kind of got fed up with China?

Look, if you want to run your own media — have control of it in China — you’ll get fed up very quick. But is there room to make interesting investments in China? It’s obvious, yes. There’s a huge amount of innovation going on in China. And we have a lot of relationships there: partly friendships, like with [Alibaba founder] Jack Ma, but also with Edward Tian, who’s starting a vast cloud operation in Beijing. He runs funds, a few funds, in which we have 20% stakes, which have done very well. As for making movies in China, we’re going to try again. But in the past it has been impossible to get American directors to go there. Because once you get there, they want to censor every line in every movie, and they can take a month giving you a decision on one line.

Part of the reason Murdoch is so globally powerful — and controversial — is that he has used his media properties to wield political clout. In the U.S. there’s no better example than Fox News, which routinely tramples on its own slogan, “Fair and balanced.”

Does it bother you at all, Rupert, that there is a view that Fox News has contributed in a big way to the political discontent in the U.S., degraded the political process, and maybe, in spotlighting the Tea Party, even hurt the Republican Party?

I think it has absolutely saved it. It has certainly given voice and hope to people who didn’t like all that liberal championing thrown at them on CNN. By the way, we don’t promote the Tea Party. That’s bullshit. We recognize their existence.

Does it bother you that Facebook is as successful as it is, and MySpace could have been Facebook?

I think that was one of our great screwups of all time.

What was the mistake? Buying it?

It was part of Fox. No one knew anything about it, so they [installed] a bunch of people to try to watch it. If they weren’t happy with the people running it, they should have gone and hired Mark Zuckerberg or someone like him, all right? I mean, when Mark came, we had just bought it for $600 million. Everybody thought [it was worth] $6 billion, and we were hailed everywhere for a very short time. I remember Mark coming down to visit my ranch. He was a very shy, quiet young man of about 20 or 21. And he was all for us getting together. And I didn’t take him up on it. I think he’s done a brilliant job.

Would you put your money into Facebook today?

The people in Silicon Valley don’t agree with me, but I think that $200 billion [market cap] for that, no matter how good the company, is going to be very hard to justify in the long term. I don’t have confidence in the permanence of any particular social app or social network, you know?

Obviously you like Twitter.

My family are horrified that I’m on it. They think it’s ridiculous. And people like [News Corp. CEO] Robert Thomson have said, “No, it’s extremely good personal public relations to show you’re interested in more than just making money.”

Is cable consolidation your biggest worry? No.

We’re all standing back at the moment and having a look at this big cable consolidation and haven’t decided yet whether it’s any threat to us. And that would go for other broadcasting companies and Silicon Valley companies. We’ve not decided to make any submissions or get too excited about it. Look, Comcast gives a very good service. And if they could make Time Warner as good as they are, a lot of people would benefit.

What kind of a leader are you?

I’m a permanently curious person. I probably waste my time being curious about things that have got nothing to do with the business sometimes. What keeps me alive, certainly, is curiosity.

What are your thoughts on the next U.S. presidential race?

Oh, I have no settled thoughts at all. I’m watching it with great interest.

What are your unsettled thoughts?

I think there are some very interesting candidates.

Could you live with Hillary Clinton as President?

I could live with Hillary as President. We have to live with who we get. We don’t have any choice.

Can you envision yourself supporting Hillary?

It would depend on the Republican candidate totally.

Who do you think the Republican candidate will be, or who would you like it to be?

I think it’s between four or five people. It’s not necessarily, although slightly, in order of preference: Jeb Bush, Paul Ryan, whom I have particular admiration for. I do for both. [Chris] Christie could recover. Scott Walker, whom I don’t know, and Rand Paul, whom I agree with on a great number of things but disagree strongly on some things — too strongly perhaps to vote for him.

You disagree with Paul most strongly on what?

Foreign policy.

Why do you admire Paul Ryan?

He is the straightest arrow I’ve ever met. He’s hardworking. He knows where every dollar goes in Washington. He’s emerging as the natural leader. I almost think that because of the position he’s in, he’s not the most important, but he’s the most influential Republican in his party at the moment in Washington.

What do you like about Jeb Bush?

I think he’s a man of very fine character. He was a great governor. And I particularly like his policy on education, which I’m hardest on. My number one.

You’re spending a lot of money in the education space. I’ve read about Amplify. It looks like, “Oh, boy, this is one of Rupert Murdoch’s passion plays.”

It’s a big passion play gamble, yes. Well, we would not think it a gamble. We have hundreds of people on it, preparing these classes and the software that goes into them. When you get a tablet, which allows the teacher to assess each child day by day, it’s a huge teachers’ aid and a huge aid to kids. Because kids, when they’re 3 years old, never mind when they’re 10, would rather be working on an electronic device and learning. Every lesson now is animated, so that’s what’s taking time. And then we test them in front of kids and bring in groups of teachers on every single 40-minute class we prepare.

Do you envision this to be a high-return business?

Potentially it will be, but it’s a few years out.

Let’s talk briefly about HarperCollins. Book publishing is another business under great stress.

We were going to make a record profit this year. We find electronic publishing of books very good. People are buying more books. They buy them at lower prices. We still get a good margin, and we don’t have to have huge warehouses and take returns from every bookshop in the world. Our experience with ebooks is very good, and we intend to expand it.

Do you read books on your iPad?

I’ve got to confess, I don’t. It’s a generational thing. I’ve never bought a Kindle. I ought to get one, I guess. If you look at our business, Kindle is infinitely bigger (than the iPad), Amazon infinitely bigger than Apple. Apple may catch them, I don’t know.

It’s been a challenging decade for Murdoch’s adult children. After Lachlan left News Corp. to go back to Australia in 2005, James served his father loyally — and got tarred in the phone-hacking scandal after taking charge of News Corp.’s British newspapers in 2007. Family ties frayed in 2012 when Rupert’s daughter Elisabeth, who chairs London-based TV production company Shine Limited, spoke disapprovingly of News Corp.’s handling of the hacking scandal while delivering an address in Scotland known as the MacTaggart Lecture.

Do James and Lachlan’s new positions mean that they are first in line to lead the businesses after you retire?

Well, the job is not over yet. But yes, it does. But I’m going to be here for a long time. And so will [21st Century Fox president and COO] Chase Carey and Robert Thomson, the CEO of News Corp. Robert is the youngest of the three of us, so we’ll get more years out of him.

Is James an equal or almost-equal to Chase Carey, who is president and COO at 21st Century Fox?

Chase is president of the company. [James] certainly will be reporting to Chase, but a lot more people [than before] will be reporting to James

Do you read books on your iPad?

I’ve got to confess, I don’t. It’s a generational thing. I’ve never bought a Kindle. I ought to get one, I guess. If you look at our business, Kindle is infinitely bigger (than the iPad), Amazon infinitely bigger than Apple. Apple may catch them, I don’t know.

It’s been a challenging decade for Murdoch’s adult children. After Lachlan left News Corp. to go back to Australia in 2005, James served his father loyally — and got tarred in the phone-hacking scandal after taking charge of News Corp.’s British newspapers in 2007. Family ties frayed in 2012 when Rupert’s daughter Elisabeth, who chairs London-based TV production company Shine Limited, spoke disapprovingly of News Corp.’s handling of the hacking scandal while delivering an address in Scotland known as the MacTaggart Lecture.

Do James and Lachlan’s new positions mean that they are first in line to lead the businesses after you retire?

Well, the job is not over yet. But yes, it does. But I’m going to be here for a long time. And so will [21st Century Fox president and COO] Chase Carey and Robert Thomson, the CEO of News Corp. Robert is the youngest of the three of us, so we’ll get more years out of him.

Is James an equal or almost-equal to Chase Carey, who is president and COO at 21st Century Fox?

Chase is president of the company. [James] certainly will be reporting to Chase, but a lot more people [than before] will be reporting to James

How did you persuade Lachlan to come back?

Look, he was always going to come back. Lachlan is someone who’s been in love with media from the age of 12. He spent all his vacations working in pressrooms. But Lachlan and James and I had a very serious talk about how we can work as a team in July of last year. It was at the Allen & Co. conference. We broke away for a meal. We had two or three hours together. Lachlan was not not going to come back. It was a question of how we would work together. How would we be a team?

Lachlan is a wonderful human being with his feet very firmly on the ground. He has built a very interesting business in Australia for himself, although he stayed on our boards.

And James too. Everyone talks about hacking in London. That all happened long before James took charge. He took STAR television and [made it] the No. 1 broadcaster in India, with about eight channels, and is making a big difference to that country. And then he went to BSkyB, where people said, “Oh, that must be nepotism.” But in fact, he went through a lot of tests. And when we took him out of his day-to-day role there and made him chairman, the same shareholders complained and said we can’t lose him. He completely changed BSkyB and lifted the bar there in every way — and added huge value to News Corp.

Liz sold her production company, Shine, to News Corp. Why did she decline to go on the News Corp. board?

I don’t know. I’d rather not go into that. We’re a very, very close family. You know what close families are like. They meet at breakfast. They meet at dinner. And they have good arguments. That doesn’t mean they don’t love each other or have room for each other in each other’s lives.

Were you bothered by Liz’s MacTaggart Lecture?

She put a lot of work into that and was very proud of it and got congratulations from everybody, except me. Because I thought it was falling in line too much with the sort of BBC and establishment. I think she was hurt when I said I didn’t really love it or like it.

Do you feel that stresses in the family have been repaired?

Oh, I hope so. I had a long and warm and loving hour with her on the phone yesterday. But mainly talking about her kids and not about the business.

Is it likely that she will get involved in the business again?

It’s more than possible. That’s all I will say.

Murdoch and Wendi Deng divorced last November after 14 years of marriage. A Vanity Fair story in March included alleged diary entries by Deng about other men. Since the divorce, Murdoch has bought a 13-acre vineyard, Moraga, above Bel Air, Calif. He also purchased a 10,000-square-foot apartment, near Madison Square Park in Manhattan, for $57.25 million

Rupert, what did you think when you read Wendi’s [alleged] diary entries?

I was shocked. But I didn’t read them and I was not given them until after I had filed for divorce.

I’m sure it made you feel as if you made the right decision.

Right. I mean, I regret the whole Vanity Fair thing. I wish we just could have got divorced quietly.

There is this view out there, and I’m sure you’ve heard it: “Boy, Rupert, he makes a decision and he moves on.”

Well, you know, everybody was talking about these things and never telling me anything. I don’t really want to go into this. But then I was told two pretty circumstantial things about the ranch [where Deng had been staying, according to Vanity Fair]. I was in Australia. When I got back, I naturally asked the staff, and it opened up. That’s the story. And then, you know, a week later I filed. As soon as I could find a lawyer.

You’re moving on now and buying real estate. You bought Moraga, a new ranch, plus a new apartment in New York.

Well, it’s like turning a new leaf. I saw the story in the Wall Street Journal Mansion section about Moraga and realized that I had met the owner 20 or 25 years ago with President Reagan at a social party, although he wasn’t a very political person. He was dying because he was 93 and had very bad emphysema. And he wanted to sell it to someone who said, “I will keep it going and not subdivide this land.”

The owner was Tom Jones, a former CEO of Northrop, which became Northrop Grumman.

He had a fascinating life. At 19, he [worked on designing] dive-bombers, which sank the Japanese and saved Australia. Before his retirement he invested in the stealth bomber. So I wanted to talk about his career at Northrop Grumman. He wanted to talk about how to grow grapes and get better wine. So we formed a real friendship. I expected him to live a bit longer, but I said he could stay in the house. I’ve now taken possession of the house. I have hired a modest decorator. I just want it to be rustic.

You have another house near Moraga, don’t you?

Yes. I have a beautiful house, which the family is screaming about me selling. I don’t want two houses a couple of miles from each other.

Is the other house on the market?

It was, and I took it off. On the pleas of James and Lachlan.

Did they say, “That’s our house and you can’t sell it”?

I said, “Put your money up.” But I haven’t seen it.

And how did you find your New York apartment?

Natalie [Ravitz, his chief of staff] found it. I was away. I’d been ill. I had a very bad month in January and February. I had a fall in San Francisco. I fell on my head. It was just stupidity in a hotel room. I’d put on some boots to go for a hike around San Francisco to be shown by Natalie, and I went down and hit my head very hard. And I got, I guess you’d call it, a hair fracture across my spine. I landed on a carpet, but on my head. I’ve never had such pain in my life. A friend of mine sent a friend of his, a neurosurgeon, down to see me, who quickly said I didn’t have any concussion. After that, I just went to my ranch and rested for three weeks.

You were lucky. When will your New York apartment be ready?

Ask the decorator. I told him four months, and he said eight. And everyone tells me it’s 12.

It’s like James Cameron making a movie.

Yeah. I will be fairly modest, to start with. I’m not going to put in great antiques or have major things that take a long time to do. I’ll buy nice, not-too-modern furniture. But it’s a modern place. It’s very high.

What floor?

On 58, 59, and 60. It’s a triplex. And I assume that my two daughters will each have their own rooms for the first time in their lives. And they’re decorating them, they think.

This story is from the April 28, 2014 issue of Fortune.

Fox News sanctioned for withholding evidence in Dominion defamation case

Jury selection begins in the Dominion defamation case against Fox News

See what Fox News tried to redact in the Dominion defamation case

The Dominion Voting Systems trial against Fox News hasn’t even started, but so much detail surrounding the $1.6 billion defamation suit has already come to light.

There have been thousands of pages of exhibits, filings and depositions released pretrial, giving people a glimpse into what was going on behind the scenes as Fox News gave on-air credence to the baseless theory that former President Donald Trump had the 2020 election stolen from him.

Some of that information was made public despite Fox News’ attempts to keep it hidden. When internal communications from Fox News were initially released last month, there were significant redactions to texts, emails and other communications.

A spokesperson for Fox News argued at the time that the redactions were “consistent with the law and court rulings” and “in accordance with the reporters’ privilege.” The network has also criticized Dominion’s filings for relying on “cherry-picked quotes without context to generate headlines in order to distract from the facts of this case.” 

Fox News did not return a request for additional comment for this article.

The judge, however, eventually agreed with lawyers for Dominion and media organizations that Fox News had blacked out too much information and more of it was made public.

What came out was information that cast Fox News in a bad light, with some hosts disparaging their guests and acknowledging that the election conspiracy theories were off base.

Jury selection began in a Delaware courtroom this week, and the trial is scheduled to begin Monday. Dominion will attempt to convince a jury that Fox News and its parent company, Fox Corp., acted with “actual malice” — knowing falsity or reckless disregard for the truth — when it aired conspiracy theories about Dominion’s voting machines and the 2020 election. Fox News has argued that the case is about the “First Amendment protections of the media’s absolute right to cover the news.”

Here’s a look at just a small part of what Fox News wanted to keep hidden before the proceedings get underway.

Slide to the left for what Fox wanted the public to see, and to the right for what was eventually revealed.

In a text message on Nov. 21, 2020, that Fox News tried to keep redacted, prime-time host Tucker Carlson indicated to Trump lawyer Jenna Ellis that he didn’t believe her claims about Dominion’s voting machines and thought they were “shockingly reckless.” Yet just two days later, Carlson was on air expressing concern about the “security of our electronic voting machines.”

“This is a real issue, no matter who raises it or who tries to dismiss it out of hand as a conspiracy theory,” he added.

In a Nov. 17, 2020, text message to an unknown individual, Carlson expressed his disdain for Trump lawyer Sidney Powell. He described her as a “psychopath,” a “crazy person” and a “f------ b----” who was “getting Trump all spun up and has zero evidence” about a stolen election. Fox News originally wanted all this information redacted.

Carlson did confront Powell privately, pushing her for more evidence for her theories, and he criticized her on air as well. Yet she continued to find a home on shows in the larger Fox family.

Fox News wanted to redact what host Jeanine Pirro’s executive producer thought of one of her monologues after the 2020 election: “This is completely crazy.”

Pirro was one of the Fox hosts who repeatedly pushed conspiracy theories about Dominion, even after it became clear — including by some people who worked at the network, according to internal messages — that there was no truth to them.

On Nov. 16, 2020, the team at the Fox Business show “Lou Dobbs Tonight” received an email from Ed Rollins, a contributor and GOP strategist who had run a pro-Trump super PAC. In that email, Rollins stated clearly that he believed Biden had won the election.

Fox says Dominion knocked millions off damages claim

Fox could likely survive a nine-figure loss to Dominion, media analysts say

WILMINGTON, Del. — Ex-Fox News producer Abby Grossberg said she recently found more evidence relevant to Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit against her former employer and plans to turn it over to the court.

Grossberg, who worked as a senior producer for hosts Maria Bartiromo and Tucker Carlson, alleged in a new sworn statement obtained by NBC News that Fox lawyers ignored repeated reminders about an additional cellphone in her possession and did not search it during court-ordered discovery. 

In the statement, Grossberg said she repeatedly told Fox lawyers that she had an inoperable company-issued cellphone that she used during 2020 election coverage. Fox lawyers told her to hang on to the device but never searched it or copied her files, as they did with her other phones, according to the statement. 

Grossberg was fired in March after she filed a lawsuit claiming that Fox lawyers coerced her into giving misleading testimony in the Dominion case and that she was being made a scapegoat for the network’s 2020 election coverage. Fox says she was fired for divulging privileged information.

Grossberg, in the new affidavit, said a forensic expert recently pulled two recordings off the broken phone that she recorded using an app called Otter, which simultaneously records and creates text transcriptions of audio files. The recordings, which she details in the affidavit and audio of which was shared with NBC News, are of phone interviews she participated in with Bartiromo: one with Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, and another with two sources who claimed to know about Dominion voter fraud. 

She said she used Otter in the normal course of her work as a producer. Recordings are saved in the Otter app, and they can also be shared.

Grossberg’s attorney, Gerry Filippatos, said the statement would be filed with the Delaware court as early as Tuesday, the day the trial is set to begin.

“Abby Grossberg stands ready to do her part to ensure that justice is done; that those who are licensed and obligated to tell the truth, and guide others to the truth, do just that. As soon as possible and practicable, Ms. Grossberg will continue to set the record straight by telling all she knows to those who need to know,” Filippatos said in a statement.

In last week’s pretrial court appearances, Dominion attorneys played other recordings Grossberg made as a producer, including one with Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani, that Dominion said they’d received from Fox just the previous week. 

That, along with confusion over News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch’s current role at Fox News, appeared to frustrate Delaware Superior Court Judge Eric Davis. Murdoch is Fox News’ executive chair, too.

He admonished the Fox lawyers for withholding evidence and not being straightforward with the court, and he said the company would have to foot the bill if an additional deposition was necessary. He also said he was considering appointing a special master to investigate legal misconduct by the attorneys over whether Fox misrepresented their discovery efforts.

“Abby Grossberg is not Dominion’s problem. It’s not my problem. Abby Grossberg is a Fox problem,” Davis said at the hearing last week.

“It may not show, but I’m very uncomfortable,” he added.

Dominion did not respond to requests for comment.

“FOX News has complied with its discovery obligations,” a Fox News spokesperson said in a statement.

At last week’s hearing, Fox lawyer Michael Skokna said Grossberg had not disclosed the existence of the Otter recordings.

In her new statement, Grossberg said that Skokna’s claim was “absolutely false” and that she had told Fox lawyers about Otter in August. 

“I proactively and specifically disclosed to the Fox News attorneys that I used an app called Otter for work purposes during the relevant time period,” she said, adding that a Fox attorney then asked her to explain how Otter works. 

Abby Grossberg.NBC News

In a filing dated Monday, Fox lawyers added that while they had not known of Grossberg’s Otter recordings, they had shared some of Grossberg’s Otter transcripts found on email. The Giuliani transcript was shared with Dominion 10 months ago, they said.

Grossberg said that she recently asked a forensic expert to review the older phone and that the expert uncovered the recordings of the two interviews. Grossberg’s attorney shared the audio with NBC News.

The first recording, made on Nov. 7, 2020, according to Grossberg’s affidavit, was of a phone interview Bartiromo and Grossberg conducted with Cruz to discuss a planned broadcast appearance. Cruz is heard discussing voter fraud allegations — including an irregularity in Michigan, which uses Dominion machines in most counties — but stresses the need for facts and proof. 

“It falls on the shoulders of the legal team that is bringing these cases to ascertain the facts. And it just can’t be, you know, someone tweeted this. It’s got to be demonstrable facts that can be laid out with evidence, because that’s what a court of law is gonna look to. Not just an allegation, but actual facts,” Cruz said on the recording. “And I hope when Rudy comes on the show tomorrow, he has some of those facts.”

Cruz did not respond to a request for comment.

Grossberg said in her affidavit that the second recording, made on Nov. 13, 2020, was of a background interview Grossberg and Bartiromo conducted with a banker named Doug Anderson, the CEO of Wall Street Capital Partners, and a male source who was granted anonymity to participate.

The men discuss conspiratorial claims about Dominion voting machines; Bartiromo promises to help “expose as much as we can,” while Grossberg presses for more information.

Anderson did not respond to a request for comment.

Grossberg said in the new statement that after she was fired last month, Fox asked her to return her ID badge and her company-issued cellphone. She said she complied but added that she forgot that she still had the older, broken device at the time.

Chris Mattei, a lawyer who sued conspiracy theorist Alex Jones for defamation on behalf of families of the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, said Dominion’s lawyers may well be able to capitalize on the situation.  

“The better thing that Dominion’s lawyers might think about is the extent to which they can use any evidence or cover up as affirmative evidence of something like consciousness of guilt,” he said, especially if Grossberg testifies for Dominion. 

Dominion included Grossberg on a list of proposed witnesses filed with the court.

“Sometimes evidence of a cover-up or bad faith in litigation — like that evidence itself — a jury might find pretty compelling,” he said.

Grossberg has filed to intervene in the Delaware defamation case, but the judge has not yet ruled on the matter.

The trial in Dominion Voting Systems’ lawsuit against Fox News is now set to begin Tuesday in a landmark defamation case that will determine whether the network can be held financially liable for publishing the false claim that voting machines rigged the 2020 election.

Dominion was the subject of conspiracy theories surrounding the 2020 presidential race as then-President Donald Trump and his allies relentlessly pushed the lie that the election, which he legitimately lost to President Joe Biden, was stolen from him.

The trial had been scheduled to start Monday. The one-day delay was announced Sunday evening by the court without elaboration.

In a pretrial ruling, Delaware Superior Court Judge Eric Davis agreed with Dominion that the claims Fox News hosts and guests promoted about the voting machine company are false. That leaves Dominion to try to convince the jury that Fox News and its parent company, Fox Corp., acted with “actual malice” — knowing falsity or reckless disregard for the truth — when it aired the conspiracy theories.

Fox News has argued that the case is about the “First Amendment protections of the media’s absolute right to cover the news.”

Here's what you need to know.

What is Dominion Voting Systems, and why did it sue Fox News in the first place?

Dominion Voting Systems is a privately owned corporation that makes voting equipment used in 28 states across the U.S. 

Dominion argues in its complaint that Fox News defamed it when the network broadcast baseless claims that it was tied to the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, that it paid kickbacks to politicians and that its machines “rigged” the 2020 presidential election by flipping millions of votes for Trump to Biden.

In 2021, the company sued seeking $1.6 billion in damages and challenging a number of claims made by hosts and guests on Fox News and Fox Business and by host Lou Dobbs on social media.

Is it just Fox News named in the lawsuit?

Not exactly. Dominion is suing Fox News Networks — which includes the namesake network and Fox Business — and Fox Corp., the more moneyed parent company.

What is Fox's defense?

Fox News has argued that it was reporting on extraordinary claims of election fraud by Trump. In defending against the claims, Fox says that it is fighting to protect press freedoms and that the Constitution shields its work there.

It has also argued that Dominion’s business wasn’t damaged.

“Dominion’s lawsuit is a political crusade in search of a financial windfall, but the real cost would be cherished First Amendment rights. While Dominion has pushed irrelevant and misleading information to generate headlines, FOX News remains steadfast in protecting the rights of a free press, given a verdict for Dominion and its private equity owners would have grave consequences for the entire journalism profession," a Fox News spokesperson said in a statement.

Fox's lawyers have also argued that Fox Corp. wasn't involved in publishing the claims and therefore isn't liable for the alleged defamation.

Will Dominion have to prove Fox's claims about it were wrong?

No. Dominion has already proven in court that the claims are baseless; Judge Davis ruled that he would instruct the jury that the claims are false.

“The evidence developed in this civil proceeding demonstrates that is CRYSTAL clear that none of the Statements relating to Dominion about the 2020 election are true,” Davis wrote in an earlier 81-page ruling allowing the case to proceed to trial, emphasizing the word “crystal.”

Why is the case important? 

The case is a historic media law dispute with far-reaching implications. A victory for Fox News may fuel lawmakers’ efforts to limit the protections media outlets enjoy and would undoubtedly embolden people who want to broadcast false claims and conspiracy theories. A victory for Dominion could fuel copycat lawsuits. It would also be the first real apparent price paid for the stolen election lies Trump and his allies advanced.

What’s the legal standard for defamation?

To prove Dominion was defamed, the company’s lawyers will need to prove that a damaging, false claim was published with actual malice — in other words, by a journalist who knew the claims were false or who recklessly disregarded the truth when they were published.

Who's in the jury?

At the end of last week, Davis announced the court had identified enough eligible jurors to impanel a jury. Lawyers will be permitted to strike certain jurors from the pool before the panel of 12 jurors (and 12 alternates) is seated. The court is then expected to take a short break before it returns to begin opening arguments. 

The jurors will remain anonymous, identified only by numbers. 

How long will this trial go? 

The trial is expected to last five to six weeks.

Who will testify, and when?

The expected witness list includes a number of high-profile people, but when they might appear in court is an open question.

Fox Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch, Fox Corp. CEO Lachlan Murdoch and former House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., are expected to testify after Davis said he’s willing to compel their testimony. Past and present Fox News talent, including Maria Bartiromo, Tucker Carlson, Lou Dobbs, Sean Hannity and Bret Baier, are on the lawyers’ witnesses list, as well.

Can I watch it on TV?

Nope. No cameras are allowed, which is the policy of the court. Davis denied a request Thursday by a coalition of media to record and broadcast audio excerpts of the trial, as well.

“You’re getting the most access of any media in a Superior Court case in Delaware,” he said Thursday.

Why is the case being tried in Delaware? 

Fox Corp., the television networks’ parent company, is incorporated in Wilmington, Delaware.

Is it Dominion’s only lawsuit? 

Nope. Dominion Voting Systems has brought a number of lawsuits against those it says defamed it after the 2020 election. So far, Dominion's lawyers have sued Trump lawyers Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell and MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, as well as outlets Newsmax and One America News Network (OANN).

Could the parties still settle? When would the verdict come?

A settlement is possible up until the point a verdict is rendered — which is likely to be just before Memorial Day weekend. All 12 jurors must agree unanimously to find Fox liable for defamation.

Zoë Richards and Jane C. Timm

Julia Jester

Julia Jester

NBC News

Phil McCausland

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Lillian Rizzo, CNBC and Daniel Arkin

Jason Abbruzzese

Zoë Richards

Jane C. Timm

Daniel Arkin

Daniel Arkin

Julia Jester and Dareh Gregorian

Julia Jester, Jane C. Timm and Daniel Arkin

Dareh Gregorian

Daniel Arkin

Daniel Arkin

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Ginger Gibson

Megan Lebowitz

Dareh Gregorian

Julia Jester and Dareh Gregorian

Megan Lebowitz

Ginger Gibson

Jane C. Timm, Jason Abbruzzese and Kevin Collier

Daniel Arkin

Susan Kroll

Daniel Arkin

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Dominion v. Fox News

Dominion v. Fox News

Dominion v. Fox News

Fox News and Dominion reach $787.5 million settlement in defamation lawsuit

Dominion v. Fox News Daniel Arkin contributed.

Dominion v. Fox News

Dominion v. Fox News

Dominion v. Fox News

Dominion v. Fox News

Dominion v. Fox News

Dominion v. Fox News