Gavin Newsom Sues Fox News for $787M

"No more lies," California Gov. Gavin Newsom said in a post on X Friday, announcing that he has filed a $787 million defamation lawsuit against Fox News. The lawsuit filed in Delaware Superior Court centers on Fox host Jesse Watters' claim that the Democratic governor lied about a phone call from President Trump, the New York Times reports.

• They spoke on June 7—or late June 6, West Coast time—but Trump told a reporter on June 10 that they spoke "a day ago" and that he told Newsom he was "doing a bad job." In a post on X, Newsom said, "There was no call. Not even a voicemail. Americans should be alarmed that a President deploying Marines onto our streets doesn't even know who he's talking to." On his show, Watters asked, "Why would Newsom lie and claim Trump never called him?"

• Trump provided Fox News with a call log—but it showed that the call had indeed been early June 7. Newsom's lawsuit alleges that Fox made deceptive edits and falsely claimed the governor had been lying. "It is perhaps unsurprising that a near-octogenarian with a history of delusionary public statements and unhinged late-night social media screeds might confuse the dates," Newsom's lawyers wrote to Fox, per Politico. "But Fox's decision to cover up for President Trump's error cannot be so easily dismissed."
• The $787 million figure is just short of the $787.5 million Fox paid to settle a defamation case from Dominion Voting Systems over false claims about the 2020 election. "If Fox News wants to lie to the American people on Donald Trump's behalf, it should face consequences—just like it did in the Dominion case," Newsom said.
• Politico reports that Newsom's lawyers say he will drop the lawsuit if Fox retracts the claim and he gets an on-air apology from Watters.