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Fox News anchors accused of conspiring behind the scenes with Trump attorneys as they face massive lawsuit over election lies
April 13, 2021
A new court filing argues that Fox News anchors cannot hide behind the First Amendment after helping former president Donald Trump and his allies spread election lies.
Voting technology company Smartmatic filed a 120-motion asking a New York state court to reject the conservative network's attempt to dismiss a $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit by claiming its coverage was protected speech, arguing those protections should not apply because anchors knew election fraud claims were untrue, reported Law & Crime.
"This is not a game. The First Amendment does not provide the Fox Defendants a Get Out Of Jail Free card," the motion argues. "The Fox Defendants do not get a do-over with their reporting now that they have been sued."
Smartmatic attorney J. Erik Connolly accused Fox News anchors, including Maria Bartiromo, Jeannine Pirro and Lou Dobbs of inviting Trump attorneys Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell onto their programs and asking questions intended to promote the former president's claims of election fraud.
"The Fox anchors were not innocent bystanders and the disinformation generated during their interviews was no accident," the motion claims. "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."
"The filing only confirms our view that the suit is meritless and FOX News covered the election in the highest tradition of the First Amendment," the spokesperson said.
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'Con man' Trump slammed for attack on vaccine maker: 'Former guy just needs to shut up'
April 13, 2021
Reacting to the CDC's advisory to suspend Johnson & Johnson's COVID-19 vaccinations due to reports of blood-clotting issues in women, former president Donald Trump -- under whom the coronavirus pandemic raged before he failed to be re-elected -- issued a statement in which he offered up an opinion that the pause is a mistake.
As part of his statement, which also included his racist "China virus" name for COVID-19, Trump attacked fellow vaccine maker Pfizer and the FDA with Trump insisting, "They didn't like me much because I pushed them extremely hard," before taking credit for the medical breakthroughs.
While many critics of the former president -- who is increasingly being referred to to as the "former guy" -- took to Twitter to say he should be ignored, others encouraged him to just go away because he has become "irrelevant."
You can see some responses below:
@Bencjacobs Context: Pfizer announced successful trials on November 9, six days after the election in which the ne… https://t.co/X9XC3sVlPd— J... Fa... (@J... Fa...)1618327651.0
@Bencjacobs Former guy just needs to shut up. No one cares what he has to say. He is irrelevant now. What he really… https://t.co/OuOWbiR3U1— Gwennie (@Gwennie)1618327507.0
@Bencjacobs We really dont have to pay attention to the completely inappropriate ravings of a bitter old man.— mr. G (and the good trouble). (@mr. G (and the good trouble).)1618327459.0
@Bencjacobs I pity the human that had to sit in a room long enough with the Former President long enough to dictate this conspiracy theory.— mpiatt🇺🇸 (@mpiatt🇺🇸)1618327349.0
@Bencjacobs Who. Oh the disgraced twice impeached dumpster fire. He can go away if we let him.— Chris Maye (@Chris Maye)1618327923.0
@Bencjacobs Why the fuck do we care about the rantings of a retired con man in Florida?— Newman 🇺🇲 (@Newman 🇺🇲)1618327283.0
@Bencjacobs Disgraced past president says what? He’s a lunatic.— lesa-with-an-e (@lesa-with-an-e)1618331311.0
@Bencjacobs The guy that hid his own vaccination from the public, now has a strong opinion on vaccinations.— Carlos Rosado (@Carlos Rosado)1618328076.0
@kristirice47 @Bencjacobs His followers. Which has been the problem since he came down the escalator.— Tia Will (@Tia Will)1618327906.0
@Bencjacobs Thank you to whoever got Trump to say “This is all about me, and the vaccines are safe” instead of “Vac… https://t.co/dxng4fzuOI— Will Saletan (@Will Saletan)1618328897.0
@Bencjacobs Who. Cares. What. Trump. Thinks.— Meri (@Meri)1618328274.0
@Bencjacobs Yep. Donald doesn't care who gets sick. Typical former guy.— Max Bingman (@Max Bingman)1618329250.0
@Bencjacobs Why keep posting this garbage? The former guy is clearly unhinged. Let him crawl back in his hole, alone and defeated.— Susan Speakman (@Susan Speakman)1618328165.0
@Bencjacobs Only Tuesday and already I’m out of f*cks to give for anything that fat, orange puss-bag has to say.— Peter Lion (@Peter Lion)1618331222.0
@Bencjacobs My response to ex-president (by the grace of God) Trump is: It is over, https://t.co/hUOGwwuV5e— J. A. Dunleavy (@J. A. Dunleavy)1618329384.0
@Bencjacobs Desperate for attention. Even more desperate to be relevant. Knows nothing about any subject. Pathetic… https://t.co/Rz7XlGhoMc— Paula J Marcotte (@Paula J Marcotte)1618329916.0
@Bencjacobs In more relevant news.... https://t.co/HaO2SFUfky— Political Jerk (@Political Jerk)1618327785.0
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Jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny's wife, Yulia Navalnaya, said on Tuesday she was increasingly concerned for her hunger-striking husband's health after visiting him at his penal colony outside Moscow.
Navalny, who is serving a two-and-a-half year sentence on old embezzlement charges, was jailed in February after returning to Russia from Germany where he was receiving treatment for a poisoning attack he says was orchestrated by the Kremlin.
Russia's most prominent opposition figure announced a hunger strike two weeks ago to demand adequate medical treatment, and his allies said this week that authorities had threatened to force feed him.
In a post on Instagram, Navalnaya said she had visited Navalny on Tuesday and communicated with him by phone and through a glass screen.
"He is just as cheerful and fun. But he speaks with difficulty and from time to time hangs up and lies down on the table to rest," she wrote.
"I know that he is not going to give up... But after the visit with Alexei, I worry about him even more."
She added that prison officials were continuing to prevent a doctor from seeing Navalny and that he now weighed 76 kilograms (168 pounds) -- down nine kilograms (20 pounds) since beginning his hunger strike almost two weeks ago.
Navalny, who is 189 centimetres (six feet two inches) tall, had already lost significant weight in prison before launching the hunger strike.
He weighed 93 kilograms (205 pounds) when he entered the facility in February and was down to 85 kilograms (187 pounds) when he started the hunger strike on March 31.
- Koran lawsuit -
In his own Instagram post earlier Tuesday, the 44-year-old opposition politician said he was suing prison officials for denying him access to the Muslim holy book, the Koran.
Navalny said he was taking legal action against prison authorities because "they won't give me my Koran. And it's infuriating."
"When I was jailed, I made a list of ways I wanted to improve myself that I will try to complete in jail. One of the points was to deeply study and understand the Koran," he wrote.
"Books are our everything, and if you have to sue for the right to read, I will sue."
Navalny came under fire early in his political career for making nationalistic comments and deriding immigrants in Russia from predominantly Muslim countries in Central Asia.
His post came as many Muslims around the world started Ramadan after religious leaders confirmed the month of fasting would begin on Tuesday.
Navalny said he had read the Koran before but had not internalised its core tenets.
"I realised that my development as a Christian also requires studying the Koran," he wrote in the Instagram post.
Navalny's lawyers and allies are demanding that he be transferred to a regular hospital. The Kremlin has said that Navalny is not entitled to any special treatment.
Navalny has been a thorn in the Kremlin's side for a decade by probing corruption among officials and leading large protests throughout Russia.
© 2021 AFP
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