Lou Dobbs has been canceled. Well, at least his Fox Business Network show has been according to reports. The host of Lou Dobbs Tonight, routinely one of the highest-rated shows on the Fox channel, has been host to a number of wild and baseless claims about voter fraud in the wake of Donald Trump’s loss in the November election. And it may have cost him his spot on the network’s lineup.
According to CNN, Dobbs will still be employed by the network but it cited a Los Angeles Times report that Friday night was his last broadcast on the network.
Fox representatives did not immediately respond to CNN Business requests for comment, but a source close to Dobbs confirmed that he has been benched by the network.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Dobbs “remains under contract at Fox News but he will in all likelihood not appear on the company’s networks again.”
As several other reports note, the timing of the show’s cancelation coincide with a massive lawsuit levied by two voting machine companies, Smartmatic and Dominion, after Dobbs and other Fox hosts made false claims about Trump’s baseless election fraud misinformation campaign. But as the New York Times reported, a Fox statement brushed the removal of its top-rated Fox Business Channel show off as “planned changes.”
“Fox News Media regularly considers programming changes, and plans have been in place to launch new formats as appropriate postelection, including on Fox Business,” Fox said in a statement to the Times. “This is part of those planned changes. A new 5 p.m. program will be announced in the near future.”
The Times also got a quote from Donald Trump about Dobbs’ departure, calling him “great.” And as the Times laid out, all the times Dobbs defended Trump and supported his wild and baseless cries of voter fraud certainly made it a favorite of the now-former president. Which may be why Fox decided, with a $2.7 billion lawsuit at hand, the network decided to cut ties.
Don Herzog, who teaches First Amendment and defamation law at the University of Michigan, said it was possible the cancellation could help Fox in its defense of the lawsuit.
If Mr. Dobbs had continued to discuss Smartmatic or promote election fraud on his program, the network could have found itself liable for each new claim, Mr. Herzog said.
The network also could argue that the lawsuit made them aware of untruths that Mr. Dobbs had helped spread. And in a trial atmosphere, the cancellation of Mr. Dobbs’s program might help persuade jurors that the network was acting in good faith.
Dobbs’ future in television is uncertain at this point, but if he’s looking to move to another right wing TV network like Newsmax he might have some legal trouble there as well.