Judge delays Dominion and Fox News trial until Tuesday amid report on push for settlement

The trial in the closely watched $1.6bn defamation lawsuit between Dominion Voting Systems and Fox will begin a day later than scheduled, the judge overseeing the case announced on Sunday evening, hours before opening arguments were set to begin on Monday.

The trial was rescheduled to begin on Tuesday. Eric Davis, the Delaware superior court judge overseeing the case, did not say why the trial was being delayed. “The court has decided to continue the start of the trial, including jury selection, until Tuesday, April 18, 2023 at 9am. I will make such an announcement tomorrow [Monday] at 9am in Courtroom 7E,” he said in a statement released through a court spokesperson.

The Wall Street Journal, citing a person familiar with the matter, reported on Sunday that Fox had made a late push to settle the case out of court. Spokespeople for Fox and Dominion did not immediately return a request for comment.

The announcement came on a quiet Sunday evening in Wilmington, the venue for the trial because Fox, like many US corporations, is incorporated in Delaware, where there are generous tax benefits. A reporter or two could be seen doing a television standup outside the courthouse on Sunday afternoon.

Dominion is asking a Delaware jury to award $1.6bn in damages because it says Fox knowingly or recklessly disregarded the truth when it broadcast outlandish lies about its voting equipment. US law sets a very high bar to win a defamation lawsuit and cases rarely go to trial.

Dominion’s case, experts say, is unusually strong. It has drawn national attention because it amounts to one of the most aggressive efforts to hold Fox, or anyone, responsible for spreading misinformation about the 2020 election. Over the last several months Dominion has produced a trove of internal communications from Fox employees showing they knew what they were broadcasting was false.

The trial has been expected to be a blockbuster, with top Fox executives Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch expected to testify in person, along with top Fox hosts Sean Hannity, Tucker Carlson, Maria Bartiromo and Jeanine Pirro.

Fox accuses Dominion of cherrypicking evidence and has argued that it is defending the first amendment, and that a win for Dominion would lead to more lawsuits against media outlets and weaken press protections in the US. Some experts share that concern. “Unfortunately, I’d predict if Fox loses, we’ll see a significant uptick in libel cases against all news organizations,” Jane Kirtley, a professor at the University of Minnesota and former executive director of the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, wrote in an email.

Other experts say the evidence against Fox is so strong that this case could show existing media standards still provide workable protections under which outlets can be held accountable.

“The key question here is whether Dominion is asking for a watering down of the constitutional standard. Or whether it is arguing that it can clear even the staggeringly high constitutional barrier as it now exists. Everything that I have heard and read from Dominion suggests that it is the latter,” said RonNell Andersen Jones, a first amendment scholar at the University of Utah.