Floyd Abrams Calls Dominion Case ‘Extremely Threatening’ to Fox: They’re ‘Clutching’ First Amendment Like a ‘Raft at Sea’

First Amendment attorney Floyd Abrams called the Dominion defamation suit “extremely threatening” to Fox News and said conservatives are trying to move the “malice” bar in defense of the network.

Dominion is currently suing Fox over numerous statements made about their voting systems on the network in the wake of the 2020 presidential election. Revelations from filings in the case have revealed both executives and hosts at the network were skeptical of the fraud conspiracies being pushed at the time. Fox’s legal team has meanwhile accused Dominion of “cherry-picking” quotes to make their case.

Abrams has decades of arguing free speech cases behind him, and he described the Fox lawsuit as a potential landmark case.

“I think it’s an extremely threatening case to Fox, and I think it’s a very important case,” he told CNN This Morning on Wednesday.

Poppy Harlow asked Abrams if conservatives were trying to “move the malice bar, referencing the New York Times v. Sullivan decision from 1964 stating that media can be held responsible for libel only when one “knew that a statement was false or was reckless in deciding to publish the information without investigating whether it was accurate.”

Abrams said Fox is “clutching” to free speech like a “raft” against Dominion’s massive lawsuit. A number of conservatives have made the argument the First Amendment protects Fox from defamation accusations, including recent commentary from the Washington Examiner’s Quin Hillyer.

“I’m hopeful at least it’s not going to be moved, but Fox is quite understandably clutching it, a raft in a sea, because it’s very important to their defense,” he said.

What Abrams has been most surprised at is that there hasn’t been more talk of a potential settlement, arguing Dominion is in the perfect position.

“It’s big time. Look, Fox is big time. The amount of viewers it has, the impact it has on the public. And here’s a case — I can’t help but think any new lawyer, and I’ll bet any of the old lawyers, said to someone at Fox, ‘maybe this would be a good case to put behind you.’ Maybe there’s some way to settle this. Maybe there’s some way to settle this consistent with rationality,’” he said.

Watch above via CNN.

(Disclosure: Abrams is the father of Mediaite founder Dan Abrams.)

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