Quite a few people in our country believe that newspapers and news organizations lie. I had an argument with a guy just last week who claimed the New York Times routinely lied. If this were the case, of course, the Fox News case would have been one of many. In fact, very few media trials occur.
Those cases that are brought seldom reach the courtroom. The plaintiffs must, under current rulings, show “actual malice.” News organizations make mistakes or occasionally rely on bad sources, but they don’t deliberately lie. (By the way, Alex Jones did deliberately lie, but Alex Jones’s “Infowars” was not considered a news organization.)
What made the Fox case unique and what made the amount granted to Dominion the highest award ever granted in this type of case was the fact that Fox did knowingly lie and did it with “actual malice.” The Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, the Allentown Morning Call, and the Lehighton Times News don’t do that.
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