Updated Jul 23, 2024 - Politics & Policy

Judge dismisses disinformation expert's defamation suit against Fox News

Rebecca Falconer

Nina Jankowicz, a disinformation expert and vice president at the Centre for Information Resilience, gestures during an interview with AFP in Washington, DC, on March 23, 2023. — Nina Jankowicz, a disinformation expert and CEO and cofounder of The American Sunlight Project, in Washington, D.C., in March 2023. Photo: Bastien Inzaurralden/AFP via Getty Images

Disinformation expert Nina Jankowicz's defamation lawsuit against Fox News was dismissed by a Delaware judge on Monday.

The big picture: Nina Jankowicz alleged she resigned as executive director of the Biden administration's since-disbanded Disinformation Governance Board "as a result of Fox's false statements and the ensuing harassment."

But Colm Connolly, chief judge of U.S. District Court in Delaware, ruled Monday that 36 of the 37 statements Jankowicz cited in her suit referred to the board and not her.
Connolly wrote in his opinion that the other statement, by Fox News host Sean Hannity, which broadcast her image in a segment in which he said that "the Board was a 'department … dedicated to working with the special media giants for the purpose of policing information'" was "not defamatory" because the statement was "not false."

What we're watching: The disinformation expert's legal team plans to appeal the ruling, per an emailed statement from Rylee Sommers-Flanagan of Upper Seven Law, counsel for Jankowicz, on Monday night.

What they're saying: A spokesperson for Fox News Media said in an emailed statement Monday: "This was a politically motivated lawsuit aimed at silencing free speech and we are pleased with the court's decision to protect the First Amendment."

Read the opinion in full, via DocumentCloud:

Go deeper: Hunter Biden drops lawsuit against Fox News over miniseries

Editor's note: This article has been updated with comment from lawyer Rylee Sommers-Flanagan.

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Judge dismisses disinformation expert's defamation suit against Fox News

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