Newsmax agreed to settle a defamation lawsuit filed against the company by Dominion Voting Systems for $67 million. Dominion claimed that guests on the network such as attorney Sidney Powell and former New York Governor Rudy Giuliani falsely stated that Dominion’s voting machine technology was manipulated to help Joe Biden defeat Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential election. Newsmax said they were forced to settle since rulings by the judge indicated the network would not receive a fair trial.
The settlement was made public in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission earlier this summer by the network. Newsmax’s lawyers had argued that the statements of its guests were protected by the First Amendment.
"The Delaware court under Judge Davis effectively enforced a confiscation of our property because our reporting was not always sympathetic to Joe Biden," Newsmax CEO Christopher Ruddy said.
“Newsmax believed it was critically important for the American people to hear both sides of the election disputes that arose in 2020,” the company said in a statement, and maintained that their coverage was “fair, balanced, and conducted within professional standards of journalism.”
Newsmax said it would not get a fair trial if it declined to settle and let the lawsuit proceed to a jury. "From the very beginning, Judge Davis ruled in ways that strongly favored the plaintiffs and limited Newsmax's ability to defend itself," the network said. Newsmax “determined the Delaware Court with Judge Eric Davis presiding over the case would not provide a fair trial wherein the company could present standard libel defenses to a jury.”
The company pointed out four ways that Judge Eric M. Davis, who was appointed to the bench by a Democratic governor in Delaware and who presided over Dominion’s lawsuit against Fox News and Smartmatic’s lawsuit against Newsmax, allegedly treated the company unfairly.
First, Newsmax said Davis ruled on issues that should have been left up to the jury to decide, allowing them to weigh the evidence presented by its defense. Instead, Davis ruled that the network committed defamation per se against the plaintiff in each of the 19 alleged statements.
Second, Davis indicated he would refuse to allow the jury to hear that Fox News already paid a $787 million settlement to Dominion over similar allegations, which was “essential for the jury to evaluate damages and for them to understand the plaintiff was more than compensated for any potential harm it had alleged.”
Third, Davis entered partial summary judgment against Newsmax Broadcasting LLC, a subsidiary, after it was added to the lawsuit against parent company Newsmax — without giving the subsidiary notice or due process.
Finally, Newsmax said Davis allowed “[e]xcessive and intrusive discovery,” allowing the company to “comb through extensive communications including personal emails, cell text messages, and other documents of reporters and company executives that were completely unrelated to the issues in the case.”
Newsmax warned other companies not to incorporate in Delaware, but to move their incorporation to states with fairer judges such as Florida.
In the Dominion lawsuit against Fox News, Davis ruled that the 20 statements made on Fox News about Dominion were false as a matter of law. He stated, “The evidence developed in this civil proceeding demonstrates that is CRYSTAL clear that none of the Statements relating to Dominion about the 2020 election are true.” He said the jury would receive instructions to that effect.
Davis said since the statements constituted defamation per se, Dominion did not need to prove actual financial harm to seek damages. If the case had gone to trial, a jury could have easily awarded over $1 billion in damages against the network.
Newsmax settled last September for $40 million in a similar defamation lawsuit filed by voting technology company Smartmatic. In a ruling earlier this year, Davis denied Newsmax’s motion to dismiss Smartmatic’s defamation claim, finding that the company’s allegations supported a “reasonable inference” that Newsmax acted with reckless disregard for the truth, meeting the high bar for defamation. He stated, “Newsmax either knew its statements regarding Smartmatic’s role in the election-fraud narrative were false, or at least it had a high degree of awareness that they were probably false.”
Smartmatic sued One America News Network (OANN) for the same reasons. OANN settled in April 2024 under confidential terms. The lawsuit was presided over by U.S. District Judge Carl J. Nichols in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. Nichols has previously ruled against the Trump administration. On February 7, 2025, Nichols issued a temporary restraining order blocking the Trump administration from placing 2,200 USAID employees on administrative leave and recalling overseas employees, reinstating 500 already on leave. Nichols issued an injunction in 2020 partially blocking President Trump’s executive order banning TikTok transactions. Nichols presided over the 2022 trial of Trump’s associate Steve Bannon, resulting in a jury convicting him of contempt of Congress for defying a subpoena related to the January 6 investigation.
Smartmatic also sued Fox News for $2.7 billion. The case is advancing towards a trial in 2026. Judge David B. Cohen, who ran as a Democrat for New York Supreme Court, has ruled so far that Smartmatic sufficiently alleged Fox News acted with actual malice and a “reckless disregard for the truth.”