TV News LIES

Magnate Rupert Murdoch’s surprise announcement Thursday that he’s stepping down as leader of his two companies leaves his son Lachlan firmly in line of succession at Fox and the rest of the media empire.

The 92-year-old Australian billionaire’s creation of Fox News Channel has made him an enduring force in American politics. He inherited a newspaper in Adelaide, Australia, from his father in 1952 and eventually built a news and entertainment enterprise dominant in the United States and Britain.

Fox said Murdoch would become chairman emeritus of both the news network’s parent company, Fox Corp., and the News Corp. media holdings, effective in November. Lachlan will become News Corp. chairman and continue as chief executive officer of Fox Corp.

Republican lawmakers are calling for the State Department to probe how the Tehran Times, an Iranian state-run media outlet, obtained a purported memo informing U.S. Special Envoy for Iran Rob Malley that his security clearance was suspended.

House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Mike McCaul (R-Texas), said Monday in a statement that Foggy Bottom “needs to do a top to bottom security review, because I am concerned they have a leak.”

McCaul also touched on concerns that the Tehran Times has again obtained information that has eluded lawmakers who have demanded to know more about an ongoing investigation into Malley, which involves questions about whether he should be allowed to handle classified information. Last month, McCaul threatened to subpoena the State Department for details of the case.

“If this memo is authentic, it is extremely concerning, especially since this is not the first time the Iranian regime’s mouthpiece has appeared to have sensitive U.S. government information recently while Congress is kept in the dark,” McCaul said.

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Authorities have announced the controversial search warrant of a local Kansas newspaper office has been withdrawn.

The Marion county attorney Joel Ensey announced that following a review of the search warrants made last Friday at multiple locations in Marion county, he has “come to the conclusion that insufficient evidence exists to establish a legally sufficient nexus between this alleged crime and the places searched and the items seized”.

On Friday, local police raided the office of local newspaper Marion County Record, the home of publisher Eric Meyer and his mother, as well as the home of the vice-mayor, Ruth Herbel. As part of the raid, the city’s police force seized computers, cellphones and reporting materials.

The raid has triggered widespread criticisms by press freedom advocates who likened the move to seizures by authoritarian regimes and a violation of first amendment rights. In a letter to the chief of the Marion police department on Sunday, over 30 news organizations as well as the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press said that there “appears to be no justification for the breadth and intrusiveness of the search”.

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The co-owner of a small Kansas newspaper whose offices and staff were raided by local police officers conducting a leak investigation has died after the situation left her “stressed beyond her limits”, according to the publication.

Joan Meyer, 98, collapsed on Saturday afternoon and died at her home a day after she tearfully watched officers who showed up at her home with a search warrant cart away her computer as well as an internet router, reported the Marion County Record, which she co-owned. After officers also photographed the bank statements of her son, Record publisher Eric Meyer, and left her house in mess, Meyer had been unable to eat or sleep, her newspaper said.

Meyer was “in good health for her age”, the weekly newspaper asserted. And the headline of its report on her death said the police’s decision to raid the Marion Record’s offices along with the homes of its reporters and publishers was not only illegal – but had also contributed to bringing on the end of Meyer’s life.

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The man at the centre of a right-wing conspiracy theory surrounding January 6 and the attack on the US Capitol has filed a defamation lawsuit against Fox News and Tucker Carlson for amplifying a “fantastical” story alleging he is an undercover federal agent who incited a riot.

A lawsuit from Ray Epps follows a cease-and-desist letter sent to the network earlier this year, demanding that Carlson retract his “false and defamatory” statements about him and deliver a “formal on-air apology” for the “lies” he promoted.

“Fox’s role in creating and disseminating destructive conspiracy theories has already been well documented,” according to the lawsuit filed in Delaware Superior Court on 12 July.

Mr Epps and his wife Robyn – who both voted for Donald Trump and were “loyal” viewers of Fox and its now-former most-watched personality – were subject to campaign of “falsehoods” that “have destroyed Ray’s and Robyn’s lives,” according to the complaint, which seeks unspecified damages.

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