Although receiving a $750 million settlement seems like a significant triumph, why did the business still fail? The solution might surprise you.
The CEO of Dominion Voting Systems thinks his firm has a difficult future.
Moments before their defamation case was to go to trial, Dominion and Fox News agreed a $787.5 million deal.
According to Dominion CEO John Poulos, despite the company’s windfall, the bad press has irreversibly damaged its brand.
“It basically put us into a death spiral,” Regarding the alleged slander, he stated. “And by accusing us of the greatest American crime in history, it turned us, as one of our customers has described, as the most demonized brand in the United States.”
Dominion has been conducting operations since 2002. However, they didn’t become well-known across the nation until the contentious allegations of electoral meddling during the 2020 presidential election.
Former President Donald Trump and his allies accused the organization purportedly trying to help Joe Biden win of meddling with the election.
Fox reached a settlement for a substantial quantity of money since there was insufficient proof to back up the accusations, which meant they were never established.
Poulos believes that the bulk of the company’s clients won’t renew their current contracts when they expire, if not all of them.
“Earlier this year, Shasta County in northern California ended its contract with Dominion despite not having a replacement vendor lined up,” TIME reported.
“It’s just easier for our customers to use something that’s not Dominion,” Poulos said. “We just know that our business ultimately goes to zero.”
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“Eventually, I suspect all of our customers will go a different direction,” he added. “It’s just a matter of time.”
After the Fox settlement was disclosed, Poulos told TIME that “Dominion experienced a spike in death threats” and that he and Dominion were dedicated to keeping staff safe.
According to TIME, six defamation lawsuits against Dominion are still pending, including ones against Newsmax and One America News. However, for the company’s financial sustainability, relying only on litigation revenue is not an option.
Smartmatic, a business that develops computerized voting systems that was established barely two years before Dominion, is suing Fox once more for slander.
“Fox on-air hosts Maria Bartiromo, Lou Dobbs and Jeanine Pirro, and Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell” are also included in the lawsuit, per the business’ website.
Going all out, Smartmatic is seeking $2.7 billion in damages—nearly 3.5 times the amount of Dominion’s settlement with Fox.
On the website of the business, it was said that Smartmatic was “continuing to analyze our claims against OANN and Newsmax,” and that it had not ruled out suing those businesses as well.
