Fox News reaches settlement with Venezuelan businessman over ‘defamatory’ claims about him and 2020 election

Fox News has reached a settlement with a Venezuelan businessman who sued the right-wing network for making false claims about his involvement in the 2020 presidential election.

Court documents, filed in the Southern District of New York, show that the Rupert Murdoch-owned network and businessman Majed Khalil settled the defamation lawsuit on Saturday.

The terms of the settlement have not been released.

“This matter has been resolved amicably by both sides,” a spokesperson for Fox News said in a statement. “We have no further comment.”

Mr Khalil sued Fox News and one of its former hosts Lou Dobbs over statements made about him after Donald Trump lost the 2020 election to President Joe Biden.

Both on air and on Twitter, Mr Dobbs and Fox News’ guest and conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell had falsely accused Mr Khalil of playing a key role in rigging the election against Mr Trump.

In one tweet, Mr Dobbs urged his viewers to “get familiar with” Mr Khalil and three other individuals as the orchestrators of what he described as a “cyber Pearl Harbor”.

Multiple investigations – including by Mr Trump allies – uncovered no widespread fraud in the election.

Mr Dobbs was taken off air at the network in February 2021.

The settlement with Mr Khalil comes just days before jury selection is set to begin in a separate – and historic – defamation case brought against the right-wing network.

Dominion Voting Systems has accused Fox News of pushing pro-Trump conspiracy theories about its ballot counting technology around the 2020 presidential election in a move that “recklessly disregarded the truth”.

Documents so far handed over as part of the lawsuit have revealed that Fox News’ biggest hosts and right-wing figures privately dismissed Mr Trump’s claims about the election being stolen – all the while pushing the conspiracies on air to their viewers.

Fox News has denied the allegations.