Fox Business abruptly canceled Lou Dobbs Tonight, his performance with the highest ranking, and a prominent platform for one of the strongest pro-Trump votes on cable news.
The cancellation, reported by the LA Times on Friday, comes just one day after voting software company Smartmatic filed a defamation suit against Fox Corporation, Fox News, and three Fox anchors – including Lou Dobbs – over false allegations that their technology was used. to commit voter fraud.
It is not clear exactly why Dobbs’s performance was canceled. Some media analysts, including CNN’s Brian Stelter, say that despite his onslaught, Dobbs caused trouble for Fox Business even before his lawsuit, and reported that his insistence on repeating Trump’s false allegations of election fraud deterred major advertisers. Fox had earlier announced that it was considering changes to its line-up after the presidential election, and on Friday said the cancellation was part of the planned changes.
“As we said in October, Fox News Media is regularly considering the changes in programming and there are plans to apply new formats after the election, including to Fox Business – this is part of the planned changes,” Fox News said. Media spokesman said. in a statement. A new 17:00 program will be announced soon. ‘
Given these plans for new shows and the advertiser, the emergence of the defamation law may accelerate the considerations that were already underway.
Dobbs is still on contract with Fox News Media, but the company has no plans to put him on the air again, according to the New York Times. It is unclear what, if any, action Fox can take with respect to his two other star anchors mentioned in the Smartmatic case, Maria Bartiromo and Jeanine Pirro.
A right-wing populist who first became known on CNN, Dobbs was an early supporter of the racist conspiracy theory for birtherism – who falsely claimed that former President Barack Obama was not born in the US – helped former President Donald Trump to popularize. Dobbs later used his Fox Business show to defend the Trump administration and influence his trade and immigration policies. He also stepped up Trump’s disinformation campaign to question the outcome of the 2020 election.
This support for Trump led the former president on Friday to issue a statement supporting Dobbs: ‘Lou Dobbs is and was wonderful. No one loves America more than Lou. He had a big and loyal following who will be watching closely for his next move, and the next one includes me. ‘
But that support also legally jeopardized Dobbs, and his employer. Smartmatic’s lawsuit alleges that Dobbs, as one of Fox Business’s leading hosts, ruined the company’s future earnings by accusing the election. For example, on one episode in November, Dobbs reacted favorably to Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who said in an interview that Smarmatic was founded by Venezuelans close to the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez “to determine the election.”
CNN’s chief media correspondent Brian Stelter described the cancellation of a program as popular as Dobbs’ program as’ extremely rare ‘.
“The closest thing to that is when Fox News fired Bill O’Reilly when his secret history of settlements over sexual harassment was revealed,” Stelter said Friday. ‘There’s no sign of it with Dobbs. Instead, it is Dobbs’ extreme content that is the problem and his weakness with advertisers. Of course, he was a psychopath for President Trump, one of Trump’s biggest amplifiers on TV, and there is less use for it now. ”
Fox News is rebuilding post-Trump
As Vox’s Aaron Rupar reported, Fox News Media’s channels – particularly the main Fox News Channel – have struggled to turn to a post-Trump reality. While Fox News Channel used to be the top news network during the Trump administration, this is no longer the case. As Stelter recently wrote for CNN’s trusted sources:
Nielsen numbers for January were announced Tuesday and Fox is, for the first time since 2001. third place in the cable horse cable car for three horses. On top of that, CNN was the number 1 channel in the entire cable.
It remains to be seen whether Fox News can bounce back from these numbers. However, it made changes to do just that – in January, Fox News announced a major shake-up of the day and prime-time lineups, with anchors like Martha MacCallum, Dana Perino and Bill Hemmer losing their slots and earlier in a new impression is printed. the day. Insiders at the network described the movements as demotic and a sign that the network was facing a major slump after the election.
As a channel with a special focus, Fox Business never got the same number of viewers as Fox News Channel had. At the end of 2020, the leading awards had a spectator of 300.00 (compared to Fox News’ average of 1.53 million viewers in the post-election period). But like the main Fox News Channel, Fox Business was known for branding its competitors, such as CNBC – and there is a focus on bringing new shows to the network that can do just that. For example, Larry Kudlow, Trump’s leading economic adviser, will soon have his own Fox Business show.