Fox Corp Chairman Rupert Murdoch will be required to give testimony under oath next week about Fox News’ coverage of the 2020 presidential election. The deposition is part of Dominion Voting Systems’ $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against the network.
The lawsuit claims that Fox News purposely aired false claims about Dominion’s role in the election in order to boost ratings and fight off competition from more conservative-leaning TV networks.
Murdoch’s deposition will be conducted remotely over videoconference on Dec. 13 and Dec. 14, according to a filing in Delaware’s Superior Court.
He is the highest-profile person to be deposed by lawyers for Dominion, which has been questioning network executives, producers and hosts about whether they knew that the claims made about Dominion technology on Fox’s airwaves were false.
Unpaid guests such as Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, as well as Fox hosts Jeanine Pirro, Maria Bartiromo and Lou Dobbs, have all been called upon to answer questions. Dobbs is no longer employed by the company.
On Monday, Lachlan Murdoch underwent an in-person deposition at a law firm office in Los Angeles. Murdoch is the executive chair and CEO of Fox Corp and the likely successor to his father, media mogul Rupert Murdoch. James Murdoch, former chief executive of the former Fox News parent company 21st Century Fox, was deposed on Oct. 25.
Prominent Fox hosts including Sean Hannity, Pirro and Tucker Carlson, as well as former on-air personalities, Shepard Smith, have also been deposed by lawyers for the election technology company Dominion. The company has sought to investigate the internal culture and reporting practices of the highest-rated cable news network and has obtained a substantial amount of internal communications from Fox employees and executives.
Suzanne Scott, the chief executive of Fox News, was deposed on Nov. 1, followed by Fox News president Jay Wallace two weeks later.