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Evening Standard
Evening Standard
World
Daniel Keane

Right-wing host Tucker Carlson to leave Fox News days after Dominion settlement

Tucker Carlson has left Fox News after nearly a decade as one of the network’s most popular and controversial hosts.

It comes just days after the cable giant agreed to a $787.5m settlement with Dominion over false claims regarding their voting machines, many of which were peddled by Carlson himself.

“Fox News Media and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part ways,” the network said in a statement on Monday.

“We thank him for his service to the network as a host and prior to that as a contributor.”

The network confirmed that Mr Carlson’s final show was aired on April 21, meaning he will not have the opportunity to address viewers about his departure. A rotating cast of FOX presenters will take his slot until a new host is named.

In his final show on Friday, Mr Carlson pledged “to be back on Monday” - suggesting that his departure from the network was unexpected.

Mr Carlon’s show, Tucker Carlson Tonight, was the most popular show on the network with an estimated 3.5 million viewers and the presenter wielded considerable political influence. A recent interview with former president Donald Trump amassed 6.7 million viewers.

The next most popular show on the network was Fox News’ The Five, which had 3.015 million viewers.

Dominion had alleged that statements made on Mr Carlson's show after the 2020 election were defamatory.

The firm’s legal action had concerned hether Fox was liable for airing the false claims that Dominion's ballot-counting machines were used to manipulate the presidential election in favor of Democrat Joe Biden over then-President Donald Trump.

Private messages sent by Mr Carlson revealed that he believed Mr Trump’s allegations of election fraud to be baseless - despite supportive statements he made on air.

In some of them, Mr Carlson privately criticised former Mr Trump, saying he hated him passionately.

The settlement of $787.5 million is the largest amount of money paid to conclude an American media libel case, experts have said.

Mr Carlson had been scheduled to be one of the key witnesses in the trial.

He has also consistently drawn headlines for controversial coverage, including most recently airing tapes from the January 6 Capitol insurrection to minimise the impact of the deadly attack.

Documents in the Dominion case also showed that Rupert Murdoch, the owner of Fox, and other executives believed Mr Biden had fairly beaten Mr Trump and that the results were not in doubt.

Fox Corporation – the parent company of Fox News – saw its share value drop by around 4 per cent on Wall Street following the news of Mr Carlson’s departure.

The announcement of Mr Carlson’s departure comes just days after Fox announced that one of its weekend hosts, Dan Bongino, had left the network after failing to agree a new contract.

Separately, rival station CNN on Monday announced that host Don Lemon had been fired after 17 years at the network.

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