Fox News submitted a request for brief sentence on Tuesday, as it attacked the Smartmatic company SmartMatic request for $ 2.7 billion as compensation in the defamation lawsuit against the conservative news channel.
In 2023, Fox News paid $ 787.5 million To settle a separate defamation lawsuit filed by Dominion’s voting systems for reports on President Trump’s wrong demands to fraud in the elections in 2020. But “SmartMatic is not Dominion”, according to the Fox News Legal team.
The Fox News file at the New York Supreme Court says that the network coverage of the fraud allegations of the wrong elections of Trump did not harm SmartMatic.
Boca Raton, FLA. Florida -based, which works in 40 countries, that Fox News has cost 100 people their jobs in the company and billions of dollars in assets. The company filed the defamation suit in 2021.
But Fox News argued that Smartmatic has already had a bad reputation, saying that the company provided electoral services to “a corrupt system in Venezuela for more than a decade” and “has always faced difficulties in finding governments ready to work with.”
The court said: “While the degrees of smart claims are lost contract opportunities, there is no evidence that the Fox News coverage caused the presence of a former, current or possible customer who refuses to do business with Smartmatic,” the court said.
Eric Connoli, a lawyer who represents Smartmatic, called the Fox “deviation” argument.
“This is exactly the type of tactic you expect from the aggressor,” Konoli said in a statement. “Instead of taking responsibility, they are trying to blame the victim. They attack Smartmatic to distract attention from the central issue: they distort the company and cause serious harm.”
Smartmatic was repeatedly mentioned when Trump’s lawyers Rudi Juliani and Sidni Powell appeared as guests in Fox News and Fox network programs in late 2020 and published the wrong Trump’s interests that voting machines were forged to throw elections to Joe Biden.
While SmartMatic was often mentioned in Fox News coverage, the company was barely involved in the 2020 elections. Smart equipment was used only in Los Angeles Province and in any of the countries that decided the result, a fact that was connected to Fox News at that time.
Fox News argued that reporting the allegations made by the head of the sitting and his lawyer were comfortable and protected by the first modification. Many of these wrong allegations have been amplified by Trump Fox News commentators such as Janine Peru and Maria Bartopiromo On their programs and through social media.
Motion’s Smartmatic said that journalists, hosts and executives of Fox News – including Robert Murdoch – Acknowledging in special deposits and in court They know that Trump’s allegations were wrong. They added the movement, however, they continued to broadcast them to purify their conservative viewers, indicating a reckless ignorance of the truth.
“The efforts to examine their facts refuted the accusation,” said SmartMatic. “They also believed that the guests who appear in their shows to discuss the accusation were crazy, crazy and unreliable.”
The Fox News file indicates that if the case goes to trial, the defense is likely to immerse the area by documenting other legal problems of SmartMatic over several years.
Smart President Roger Bibat and other employees were charged by the US Department of Justice in August of allegedly making illegal payments to the former Philippine Elections Commissioner in order to obtain voting machines and services used in the country’s elections for the year 2016.
Smartmatic said the issue has nothing to do with defrauding voters.
Earlier this year, Smartmatic settled a defamation lawsuit against newsmax on the right outlets, which also gave Trump food platform and did not admit that Biden was elected president More than a month after the elections were called.
