Fox News anchors, primarily Maria Bartiromo, Lou Dobbs, Jeanine Pirro, among others, have based their defense to defamation suits on their First Amendment right to freedom of speech. When one doesn’t have much, it sounds like as good a defense as any available. But it has been undermined, severely, in new filings by the plaintiffs with the trial court. The plaintiffs have pointed out that one doesn’t have a First Amendment right to conspire with attorneys for one side in a political suit to promote a false theory on behalf of one client.

At that point, it ceases to become a political opinion and transitions into an operational and litigation strategy, one that involves trashing the reputation of the company at issue.

From Law and Crime, which does a fantastic job of taking complex legal issues and makes them accessible to the average reader, as they cite from the actual brief filed with the court:

The Fox anchors were not innocent bystanders and the disinformation generated during their interviews was no accident. Prior to the interviews, the Fox anchors decided to join forces with Giuliani and Powell to disseminate disinformation about Smartmatic.

The Fox anchors knew what Giuliani and Powell would say on their shows, asked questions to elicit lies about Smartmatic, and endorsed Giuliani’s and Powell’s investigation. The Fox anchors added their own defamatory comments about Smartmatic for good measure. This was a scripted performance by the Fox anchors, Giuliani, and Powell to defame and disparage Smartmatic for personal gain.”

Well-written and well-reasoned, as one would expect from the elite law firms that litigate these types of cases.

“This is not a game. The First Amendment does not provide the Fox Defendants a Get Out Of Jail Free card. The Fox Defendants do not get a do-over with their reporting now that they have been sued.”

No. It is not a game. It was not a game when certain Fox anchors decided to further the big lie, nor is it a game now that they’re being sued. Each one of those Fox anchors must now fear for their financial future. It is entirely possible that they will lose it all and end up in bankruptcy court.

It is amazing that it never occurred to them beforehand when shouting the big lie.
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Peace, y’all
Jason
[email protected] and on Twitter @JasonMiciak