Round one goes to Hunter Biden.
Biden threatened to sue Fox News and the network couldn’t backpedal fast enough.
And Fox News waved the white flag in this disgusting act of surrender to Hunter Biden.
Fox News pulls Hunter Biden series after Biden threatens defamation lawsuit
Fox News pulled a six-part series The Trial of Hunter Biden that aired on the Fox Nation streaming service in the fall of 2022.
The series presented a mock trial of what a trial of Hunter Biden would look like if he faced charges of bribery and violating the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA).
These are the two alleged criminal violations the Biden Justice Department and the FBI feverishly worked to cover up.
Hunter Biden’s lawyer Mark Geragos demanded Fox News censor the series.
Geragos claimed that even though the series used “true information,” it defamed Hunter Biden.
“While using certain true information, the series intentionally manipulates the facts, distorts the truth, narrates happenings out of context, and invents dialogue intended to entertain. Thus, the viewer of the series cannot decipher what is fact and what is fiction,” Geragos wrote in a letter to Fox News threatening a lawsuit.
Fox News explains its capitulation
In announcing it would agree to Hunter Biden’s demands, Fox made it sound like they weren’t letting Hunter Biden dictate its programming schedule.
“This program was produced in and has been available since 2022,” a statement from Fox News read. “We are reviewing the concerns that have just been raised and — out of an abundance of caution in the interim — have taken it down.”
Fox News defended its coverage of Hunter Biden noting that he was a public figure – thus raising the threshold of proof for Biden to win a defamation case – and that it is a known fact that he was the subject of a criminal investigation.
“Hunter Biden’s lawyers have belatedly chosen to publicly attack Fox News’ constitutionally protected coverage regarding their client,” the statement continued.
“Mr. Biden is a public figure who has been the subject of investigations by both the Department of Justice and Congress, has been indicted by two different US Attorney’s Offices in California and Delaware, and has admitted to multiple incidents of wrongdoing,” Fox News added.
“Consistent with the First Amendment, Fox News has accurately covered these highly publicized events as well as the subsequent indictment of an FBI informant who was the source of certain claims made about Mr. Biden,” the statement from Fox News concluded.
What Fox News really fears
Liberals have weaponized defamation law.
By suing conservatives in liberal jurisdictions, Democrats can count on favorable judges and juries to award massive financial damages to punish conservatives for their views.
Fox News found this out when a judge in Delaware made it impossible for the network to defend itself in a defamation case brought by Dominion Voting Systems.
Dominion sued Fox for reporting on claims made by Donald Trump and his lawyers about voting machines in the 2020 election.
The judge in the case eliminated virtually every defense Fox News could have made at trial.
And while Fox likely would have won on appeal, a lengthy and costly process didn’t serve anyone’s interests.
Fox ended up paying Dominion a $787 million settlement to make the case go away.
Critics contend Hunter Biden is looking to recreate that legal dynamic against Fox News.
