Tucker Carlson tried to 'squirm out' of saying he didn't believe Trump's Dominion conspiracy theories: attorney

On Wednesday, The New York Timesrevealed that Fox News host Tucker Carlson tried to talk his way out of admitting his real thoughts on whether the 2020 presidential election was stolen, when questioned by attorneys for Dominion Voting Systems in their billion-dollar defamation lawsuit against the network.

"In Delaware Superior Court on Wednesday, Dominion’s lawyers argued that they had obtained ample evidence to make that case," reported Jeremy Peters. "One lawyer for Dominion said that 'not a single Fox witness' so far had produced anything supporting the various false claims about the company that were uttered repeatedly on the network. And in some cases, other high-profile hosts and senior executives echoed Mr. Hannity’s doubts about what Mr. Trump and his allies like Ms. Powell were saying, according to the Dominion lawyer, Stephen Shackelford."

"This included Meade Cooper, who oversees prime-time programming for Fox News, and the prime-time star Tucker Carlson, Mr. Shackelford said," the report continued. "Mr. Shackelford described how Mr. Carlson had 'tried to squirm out of it at his deposition' when asked about what he really believed. Mr. Shackelford started to elaborate about what Mr. Carlson had said privately, telling the judge about the existence of text messages the host had sent in November and December of 2020. But the judge, Eric M. Davis, cut him off, leaving the specific contents of those texts unknown."

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According to the report, star anchor Sean Hannity flatly said he knew the claims being made by pro-Trump lawyer Sidney Powell on his show were not true, and with respect to the idea that Democrats were silencing whistleblowers claiming that Dominion had flipped or rigged votes, “I did not believe it for one second.”

The $1.6 billion Dominion suit has already seen billionaire news mogul Rupert Murdoch, who owns the network, as well as his son Lachlan, a top executive there, give testimony.

In addition to Fox News, Dominion is also suing Newsmax, a rival right-wing company that hosted similar false claims about the election systems company's practices. Another Dominion suit targets MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, a longtime Trump ally who has promoted conspiracy theories about the election.