Fox News v Dominion: defamation lawsuit over election lies goes to trial – live

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House GOP debt limit vote could come next week: report

House Republicans could as soon as next week vote on their proposal to raise the US government’s debt limit, while also cutting spending to a variety of Joe Biden’s priorities, Punchbowl News reports.

The US government has hit the legal limit on how much debt it can take on, and is expected to run out of money sometime in early June, which could cause it to default on its debt for the first time in history. That would have major negative ramifications for the economy, but the GOP lawmakers say they won’t support increasing the debt ceiling without concessions from Democrats, such as spending cuts.

But House speaker Kevin McCarthy and his allies only control the chamber by a slim margin, and in a sign of how fraught the debt ceiling has become among Republicans, CNN reports at least one lawmaker won’t vote to increase the debt limit at all:

Democrats in the White House and Senate, meanwhile, say they will only support a “clean” debt ceiling increase that raises the limits without changes to spending.

There was a brief hiccup in jury selection Tuesday morning in the closely watched Dominion v Fox defamation trial.

After the twelve jurors were sworn in, one of the jurors stood up and said he couldn’t do it. The judge and lawyers from both sides spoke with him out of court and he was dismissed. Another juror was quickly sworn in.

There were a few moments of levity in the packed Delaware courtroom.

At one point, judge Eric Davis told jurors that he didn’t mind if they brought water or drinks in the court, as long as they had a lid. He quickly added “non-alcoholic”, prompting laughter.

There was also some laughing as jurors had to slide past one another as they were called into the jury box then excused. Some jurors arrived, had to shimmy down a row past all the other jurors, only to shimmy out moments later when they were excused.

Let’s shift to Washington politics for a minute to examine the bind Senate Democrats are in. They may control the chamber, but they’re having trouble confirming federal judges because of the absence of California senator Dianne Feinstein.

The 89-year-old is a member of the judiciary committee, but has been out of Washington to receive treatment for shingles, delaying crucial votes to move nominees through committees.

Last week, she asked to be temporarily replaced on the committee, but that would require the cooperation of at least some Republicans. In the clearest sign yet that the GOP won’t go along, their leader in the Senate Mitch McConnell today said he would oppose replacing her:

Kira Lerner

The Fox-Dominion defamation trial officially kicked off at 9am in Delaware superior court and the 12 jurors who will determine whether Fox News acted with actual malice were seated roughly 90 minutes later.

The jury appears to be comprised of seven Black and five white or non-Black people. A set of 12 alternates were also seated for what’s expected to be a six-week trial.

The jury selection comes after Judge Eric Davis delayed the start of the trial by one day. Either the two sides could not reach an agreement on Monday, or speculation that settlement talks were underway was untrue.

Opening arguments are set to begin after a short break. The judge and an attorney for Fox have already indicated that Dominion Voting Systems has numerous objections to Fox’s opening slides.

The Fox-Dominion trial is now under way in Delaware, where CNBC reports the first witness will testify to his efforts to convince Fox that what they were broadcasting about the 2020 election was false:

Florida governor Ron DeSantis is in Washington DC today, where he’s expected to meet with Republican members of Congress as he nears a potential run for president. That would escalate his clash with Donald Trump, who remains the strongest challenger for the presidency in the Republican party. Before he departed for the capital, the Guardian’s Richard Luscombe reports the governor made a new threat of retaliation against Disney for its criticism of his conservative policies:

Ron DeSantis has unveiled the latest act of retaliation against Disney for speaking out against his “don’t say gay” law: he’s threatening to build a new state prison next to the company’s central Florida theme parks.

The Republican governor dropped the suggestion at a hastily convened Monday lunchtime press conference, at which he laid out steps the state legislature would take to try to regain control over Florida’s largest private employer.

The move is the latest in an ongoing feud that began in March 2022 when Disney’s then chief executive Bob Chapek spoke out against a bill limiting discussion of sexuality and gender identity in Florida elementary school classrooms, dubbed the “don’t say gay” law.

Yesterday evening, Joe Biden called Ralph Yarl, the Black teen shot in Kansas City after ringing the doorbell at the wrong address, and “shared his hope for a swift recovery”, according to the White House. Here’s more about the incident and the shooter’s arrest, from the Guardian’s Richard Luscombe and Sam Levin:

A white homeowner in Kansas City, Missouri, has been charged with armed assault after he shot a Black teenager who rang his doorbell by mistake, authorities announced on Monday.

Andrew Lester, 85, is also facing a charge of armed criminal action after shooting Ralph Yarl, 16, twice on Thursday. The teenager, a high school junior, was going to pick up his younger twin brothers from a play date when he went to the wrong address. Zachary Thompson, the prosecuting attorney, announced the charges late on Monday after intense local protests and widespread outrage over the police’s decision to briefly detain Lester before releasing him without charges.

The Fox-Dominion trial was supposed to start on Monday, but was unexpectedly delayed – fueling speculation that the two sides were nearing a settlement that would forgo a trial. That apparently didn’t pan out, but The Guardian’s Mark Sweney took a look at why settling might be in the conservative network’s interest:

Rupert Murdoch’s push to try to bury a landmark defamation case against Fox News aims to avoid further damage to his media empire’s reputation – and protect the 92-year-old from a gruelling court appearance as he formulates succession plans.

Judge Eric M Davis moved on Sunday to delay the start of the $1.6bn (£1.3bn) defamation trial between Fox Corporation and Dominion, which has alleged Fox News repeatedly broadcast false claims that its voting machines were rigged, amid reports of a settlement.

However, the following day Davis confirmed the six-week trial would begin a day later than planned, with jury selection starting on Tuesday, after talks between the parties failed – for now at least.

The two most important words in the Fox-Dominion trial: 'actual malice'

The defamation lawsuit filed by Dominion Voting Systems against Fox News has already led to embarrassing revelations from inside the conservative network’s newsroom, including that some of its top stars “hate” Donald Trump and did not believe his claims that the 2020 election was stolen.

But to get $1.6bn – or any sum – out of Fox for the harm it allegedly caused to its business, Dominion’s lawyers will have to prove the network acted with “actual malice” when it aired those falsehoods in the tense weeks following Joe Biden’s election win.

The Guardian’s Sam Levine is in Wilmington, Delaware, where the trial is opening today, and breaks it all down here. Have a read:

The blockbuster $1.6bn defamation suit between Dominion Voting Systems and Fox is set to begin on Tuesday in a courtroom in Wilmington, Delaware, opening a six-week tribunal that represents one of the most muscular efforts to hold the powerful news network accountable for its role in spreading lies about the 2020 election.

Dominion is suing Fox News and its parent company Fox Corporation for knowingly spreading false claims about its equipment after the 2020 election. Fox repeatedly broadcast outlandishly false allegations that the company had paid government bribes, switched votes and was founded in Venezuela to rig elections for Hugo Chávez.

The trial was scheduled to begin on Monday, but Eric Davis, the Delaware superior court judge overseeing the case, pushed it back by a day without giving a reason. It was reported that both sides were engaged in negotiations over a settlement to avoid a trial.

Jury selection will be completed on Tuesday, followed by opening arguments.

The trial is likely to be a media frenzy. Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch, the top Fox executives, are expected to be called as witnesses. Fox News anchors Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, Maria Bartiromo and Jeanine Pirro are expected to testify at the trial.

At the heart of Dominion’s case is a trove of internal messages from Fox hosts and executives in which they openly say they knew the outlandish claims about Dominion were false. “Sidney Powell is lying, by the way. I caught her. It’s insane,” Carlson wrote in one such message, even as Fox continued to air Powell’s claims about Dominion.

“In the coming weeks, we will prove Fox spread lies causing enormous damage to Dominion. We look forward to trial,” a Dominion spokesperson said.

Defamation cases rarely go to trial because there is such a high bar a plaintiff has to clear to win. But experts observing the lawsuit say Dominion has put together an unusually strong case. The company may have strong enough evidence to show that Fox acted with “actual malice”, that Fox knew the claims were false, or that Fox acted with reckless disregard for the truth.

“It’s a rarity that we’ll see something of this caliber play out in front of a jury,” said RonNell Andersen Jones, a first amendment scholar at the University of Utah.

Fox News faces major test as Dominion defamation case goes to trial

Good morning, US politics blog readers. The biggest news this morning is happening in Wilmington, Delaware, where the defamation lawsuit filed by Dominion Voting Systems against Fox News is going to trial. Dominion, which makes hardware and software used in elections, is suing the conservative news outlet on claims it knowingly defamed its business in the aftermath of the 2020 election, when Fox was a leading conduit for Donald Trump’s unfounded conspiracy theories of vote rigging. Dominion wants the huge sum of $1.6bn for the damage caused, and the trial could see top Fox executives such as owner its Rupert Murdoch appear on the witness stand. We’ll see what emerges from the courtroom today.

Here’s what else is going on:

• Florida governor Ron DeSantis is heading to Washington DC to meet with Republicans in Congress as he continues his slow, sure progress towards announcing a run for president.

• Joe Biden will deliver remarks on his efforts to lower childcare costs at 2pm ET. White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre will brief reporters at 2.45 pm.

• A Republican-led House committee on the Covid-19 pandemic holds a hearing at 9.30am examining the origins of the virus and China’s involvement.