“Discovery will be fun,” Newsom said in a statement. “See you in court, buddy.”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom appears poised to push a massive defamation lawsuit against Fox News and one of its high-profile hosts, who recently admitted to making a “mistake” when describing a phone call between the governor and U.S. President Donald Trump.
Newsom’s legal team had earlier told Fox and co-defendant Jesse Watters that the governor would consider dropping his lawsuit if the network issued a retraction and Watters offered a formal, on-air apology.
The lawsuit, notes The Guardian, contends that Watters lied on live television when describing the timeline of communications between Newsom and Trump during the height of anti-Immigration and Customs Enforcement protests in Los Angeles and other parts of Southern California.
On June 10, for instance, President Trump said that he had spoken to Newsom about “a day ago,” claiming he had told the governor that “you’ve got to do a better job, you’re doing a bad job.”
Newsom, for his part, said that this particular exchange never happened, and that he had last spoken with Trump on June 7, before the president authorized the deployment of U.S. Marines to Los Angeles.
“There was no call. Not even a voicemail,” Newsom wrote on Twitter. “Americans should be alarmed that a president deploying marines onto our streets doesn’t even know who he’s talking to.”
In response, Trump sent a screenshot of his June 7 call log to Fox News anchor John Roberts.
Watters quickly seized the opportunity to show the screenshot on his program before playing a video clip of Trump describing the nonexistent June 10 phone call with Newsom.
“Gavin lied about Trump’s call,” read an on-screen footer displayed during Watters’ broadcast.
Newsom’s legal team said that it would voluntarily dismiss the lawsuit if Fox admitted that it falsely misrepresented the timeline of the phone call with Trump—a misrepresentation that Newsom’s office insists was an intentional manipulation of fact.
“We expect that you will give the same airtime in retracting these falsehoods as you spent representing and amplifying them,” Newsom’s attorneys wrote in a letter to Fox. “Further, Mr. Watters and Fox News must issue a formal on-air apology for the lie you have spread about Governor Newsom.”
Although Watters did issue an apology, it was curt, sarcastic, and offloaded as much of the blame as possible.
“‘Not even a voicemail’—we took that to mean there was no call ever,” Watters said in his televised apology. “We thought the dispute about whether there was a phone call at all when he said without qualification that there was no call.”
“Now Newsom’s telling us what was in his head when he wrote the tweet,” Watters said. “He didn’t deceive anybody on purpose, so I’m sorry, he wasn’t lying. He was just confusing and unclear. Next time, governor, why don’t you say what you mean.”
Newsom’s office has since expressed that the governor is eager to proceed with litigation.
“Discovery will be fun,” Newsom said in a statement. “See you in court, buddy.”
Sources
Fox News’ Jesse Watters admits mistake in program claiming Newsom lied about Trump call
Newsom ready to pursue lawsuit against Fox News host despite on-air apology
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