California Gov. Gavin Newsom is suing Fox News for defamation, seeking $787 million in damages and an apology from prime-time star Jesse Watters.
“No more lies,” Newsom said in a post on X in which he linked to a Politico article about the lawsuit, filed Friday in Delaware.
In a statement, Fox News called the lawsuit a “transparent publicity stunt” and said the governor was trying “to chill free speech critical of him.”
“We will defend this case vigorously and look forward to it being dismissed,” the statement said.
The punitive damages Newsom is seeking is the same amount that Dominion Voting received in a settlement with Fox in 2023. The company had sued Fox News for $1.6 billion over its reporting about Dominion voting machines after the 2020 election.
The New York Times reported that Newsom’s lawyers sent Fox News a letter saying the governor will dismiss the case if the network issues a formal retraction and Watters, whose show “Jesse Watters Primetime” airs weeknights at 6 p.m. MT, makes an on-air apology.
The suit stems from reporting about communication between Newsom and President Donald Trump over immigration raids in Los Angeles and the deployment of the National Guard.
Trump told reporters June 10 that he talked to Newsom “a day ago” and told him he had to do a better job.
Newsom responded in a post on X, saying “There was no call. Not even a voicemail.”
The Los Angeles Times reported that Newsom and Trump had talked “late in the night on June 6 in California, which was early June 7 for Trump on the East Coast.”
The conversation on social media quickly devolved into whether either man was lying or confused, and Trump spoke with Fox News’ John Roberts to double down on what he had said. The president also released a call log.
People on X soon began sharing the call log and saying that Newsom had lied. On a segment on his show that aired on June 10, Watters discussed the matter while a caption on the screen said “Gavin lied about Trump’s call.”
Newsom responded on social media, noting that the call date was June 7 and saying “Trump doesn’t even know what day it is.”
It’s unclear why the exact timing of the conversation matters, other than the conversation on June 6/7 would have occurred before Trump deployed National Guard troops to Los Angeles June 8.
A report in The Los Angeles Times Friday said the lawsuit puts Newsom “at the forefront of the political proxy war between Democrats and Republicans over the press by challenging an outlet that many in his party despise.”
The Times quotes from the lawsuit, which says, “By disregarding basic journalistic ethics in favor of malicious propaganda, Fox continues to play a major role in the further erosion of the bedrock principles of informed representative government.”