Fox News' election lies vs. sexism from CNN's Don Lemon. The difference? Accountability.

Let’s look at two recent media scandals and see if we can spot the difference.

First, a court filing from Dominion Voting Systems’ defamation lawsuit against Fox News claims that through text messages and sworn statements, hosts and executives at the network knew full well that Donald Trump’s claims of a stolen 2020 election were nonsense. The evidence is overwhelming, and it shows that people on air and behind the scenes knew claims of election fraud were magic beans, but that they ran with them anyway.

Fox News has not apologized to viewers, reprimanded any of its on-air hosts or offered an explanation for misleading the public.

Don Lemon's sexist comments about Nikki Haley brought swift rebuke

Over at CNN, host Don Lemon made a wildly sexist comment about GOP presidential candidate Nikki Haley, saying that the 51-year-old “isn’t in her prime” and that a woman is "considered to be in their prime in 20s and 30s and maybe 40s.”

The same afternoon, Lemon posted a tweet apologizing for the comment, and the next day he apologized to the entire CNN newsroom and was condemned by Chris Licht, the networks’ chief executive.

Lemon was off the air Monday and Tuesday; he's scheduled to return Wednesday.

Lemon’s comment was trash, but CNN acted like a legitimate news organization by swiftly addressing it and holding the host accountable.

Ageism? Great start: Nikki Haley launches GOP campaign by insulting Americans age 75 and over

But Fox News lied about an election and has yet to apologize

Fox News, on the other hand … not so much.

We haven’t seen a lick of accountability from the network, even in the face of clear evidence that it repeatedly lied and propped up conspiracy theories about something as fundamental to our democracy as a presidential election.

Of course you won’t hear about this story on Fox News. About all the network has done is release a statement saying the case is “about freedom of the press and freedom of speech.” Fine, whatever. The court will decide whether the network defamed Dominion or not.

But what’s indisputable from the evidence in the Dominion case is that Fox News personalities lied directly and repeatedly to the millions of Americans addicted to the network’s cynical brand of entertainment.

Election fraud claims were nonsense: Trump's people knew election fraud claims were 'completely nuts.' Yet they kept quiet.

Fox News viewers, where is your self-respect?

So I have a question for my Fox-News-viewing friends. You can read the court filing yourself and see how you’ve been cheated, flimflammed and hustled. But do you have enough self-respect to demand accountability?

Sean Hannity said in a sworn deposition that he didn’t believe Trump-aligned lawyer Sidney Powell’s election fraud claims “for one second,” but it didn’t stop him or the network from parroting her lies and the conspiratorial fabrications of others.

According to the Dominion court filing, Fox News host Maria Bartiromo said in a deposition: “It's easier to get good ratings when you are giving your audience something they want to hear.”

In a text message thread with a Fox News executive and two producers, Hannity wrote, “Respecting this audience whether we agree or not is critical.” One of the producers responded and referenced ratings, saying, “Our best minutes from last week were on the voting irregularities.”

'A couple of crackpots'

Thomas Wienner, a retired corporate litigator based in Michigan, told NPR, “These people were night after night, day after day, promoting theories that were ridiculous and that had been rejected by the courts. And there really was no support for them other than a couple of crackpots.”

We know, through dozens of court rulings and state-level investigations and reams of incontrovertible evidence, that the 2020 election was legitimate. The folks at Fox News knew it as well, even while they continued to spin a narrative that Trump was the true victor and President Joe Biden a fake.

They gave Fox News viewers fiction because they feared facts weren’t what viewers wanted.

Are you a news consumer or an easy mark for con artists?

It’s one thing to be lied to by a huckster, to be deceived and then, once the truth is realized, feel ashamed of your own gullibility. But to let that huckster lie to you over and over again, and to feel no shame because you love hearing the lie? That’s another matter entirely.

That doesn’t make you a news consumer. That makes you a rube. A mark.

And based on the facts in the Dominion court filing and the complete lack of accountability at the network, that’s exactly how Fox News sees its viewers.

So I’d like to know what those viewers are going to do about that, because if it were me, I’d be more than a little insulted.

Fox News is unique in its dishonesty

You can shout and holler all you want about other news organizations being “fake news,” but the truth is – and this has always been the truth – serious news organizations hold reporters and anchors and pundits accountable. If I fabricated a bunch of nonsense about an election, or anything else for that matter, and tried to pass it off as the truth, I’d be fired. And if I get something wrong in a column, it gets corrected. I’m held accountable.

Lemon’s comment about Haley on CNN was as insulting as it was ludicrous. But he at least had the decency to apologize, and he’s now feeling the weight of accountability.

That’s the way things are supposed to work.

Except at Fox News. Folks there seem confident viewers will stick around as long as the network tells them only what they want to hear.

Until those viewers summon some self-respect and demand accountability and truth, I reckon the network has it right.

Email USA TODAY columnist Rex Huppke at rhuppke@usatoday.com

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: CNN's Don Lemon held accountable for sexist comment about Nikki Haley