Hunter Biden took a step toward suing Fox News for publishing sexually explicit images of him Monday.
Lawyers for President Joe Biden's son sent a letter to Fox News and FOX Corp. alleging conspiracy to defame and unlawful publication of "hacked" images. The legal team sought corrections and on-air retractions to claims that he and his father were engaged in foreign bribery schemes, reported CNN.
“FOX knows that these private and confidential images were hacked, stolen, and/or manipulated digital material,” his attorneys wrote, and the letter contained some of the explicit images that were partially blurred out.
The publication of the photos violated "the majority of states’ laws against the nonconsensual disclosure of sexually explicit images and videos, sometimes referred to as ‘revenge porn’ laws," the attorneys added.
Fox News broadcast a mock trial of Hunter Biden on its Fox Nation streaming platform in 2022 that focused on unproven bribery allegations and published photos of him naked or engaged in sex acts.
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His attorneys accused the network of remaining silent on the indictment of FBI informant Alexander Smirnov, whose allegations against Hunter Biden had fueled the mock trial and a Republican-led impeachment inquiry into the president.
“Then, in a brazen show of no remorse, rather than walk back the story and correct the record, FOX double-downed on the debunked bribery allegation and used Smirnov’s indictment to claim this is an ‘intimidation tactic’ aimed at silencing ‘whistleblowers,’ to blame the FBI for its credulity, and to suggest an even deeper conspiracy,” the letter alleges.
Hunter Biden's attorneys asked Fox News to issue editor's notes on online reporting to notify readers of Smirnov's indictment and for hosts Sean Hannity, Maria Bartiromo, Jesse Watters and others to let viewers know during their broadcasts that they had "been sharing a debunked allegation from a source who has been federally indicted.”
The network issued a statement claiming its coverage of the president's son was protected under the First Amendment.
“Hunter Biden’s lawyers have belatedly chosen to publicly attack Fox News’ constitutionally protected coverage regarding their client," said a FOX News Media spokesperson. "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. 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.”