agreed to pay $787.5 million to settle a landmark defamation lawsuit brought by Dominion Voting Systems, bringing an abrupt end to a high-stakes trial just as opening statements were set to begin in Delaware Superior Court.
The massive financial agreement, announced Tuesday afternoon, is the largest publicly known defamation settlement in U.S. history involving a media company. The previous benchmark was set in 2017 when ABC News paid $177 million to resolve a dispute with meat processor Beef Products Inc. over its textured protein product.
Proceedings in Wilmington, Delaware, had ground to a sudden halt for more than two hours following the lunch recess after a jury was sworn in earlier in the day. The unexpected pause sparked intense courthouse speculation before attorneys finalized the accord minutes before the official announcement. Delaware Superior Court Judge Eric Davis praised the legal teams following the resolution, telling the courtroom he considered it the finest lawyering he had witnessed since taking the bench in 2010.
In a statement issued after the settlement was reached, acknowledged the court’s prior rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false. In a major pretrial decision on March 31, Judge Davis had ruled that Dominion successfully proved twenty specific broadcasts from late 2020 contained blatantly untrue assertions that the company rigged the presidential election.
Justin Nelson, lead counsel for Dominion, told reporters that the settlement achieved the company’s dual goals of accountability and compensation. While the terms do not require Fox anchors to issue an on-air retraction, Nelson emphasized that the financial penalty and the network’s formal acknowledgment serve as a powerful vindication. Internal text messages and emails surfaced during the litigation revealed that top executives and prominent hosts privately ridiculed election fraud conspiracy theories even as the network permitted them to be aired.
Dominion CEO John Poulos declared that Fox had admitted to spreading falsehoods about the voting technology firm. Poulos thanked election workers across the country, stating that the outcome underscored the vital importance of upholding facts for the preservation of democracy.
Despite resolving the dispute with Dominion, faces additional ongoing legal challenges. Smartmatic, another voting technology provider, is pursuing a separate $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit against the network in connection with its post-election coverage. Furthermore, Dominion maintains active pending lawsuits against other right-wing media outlets, including Newsmax and One America News, as well as prominent Trump allies such as Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, and Mike Lindell. All of those defendants have denied wrongdoing and continue to contest the litigation.
