AP Photo/Yuki Iwamura
Fox Corporation chief legal and policy officer Viet Dinh, who oversaw the network’s legal battle with Dominion Voting Systems that ended in a bruising $787.5 million settlement, is stepping down.
“We appreciate Viet’s many contributions and service to FOX as both a board member of 21st Century Fox and in his role over the last five years as a valued member of FOX’s leadership team,” Lachlan Murdoch, the CEO of Fox Corp., announced on Friday.
Murdoch said Dinh would remain with Fox in a different capacity: “We are grateful that he will continue to serve FOX as Special Advisor where we will benefit from his counsel.”
The major shakeup at Fox News’s parent company comes a few months after the network settled a defamation lawsuit with Dominion, the voting tech company that was the subject of 2020 election conspiracy theories spread by former President Donald Trump and his allies.
A New York Times story published in June put a spotlight on Dinh, reporting that his “overly rosy” assessment of Fox’s chances in the Dominion case “informed a series of missteps and miscalculations over the next 20 months” that ultimately resulted in the biggest defamation settlement in history.
The departure is even more notable considering how close Dinh is to Lachlan Murdoch. The former assistant attorney general is godfather to one of the Australian media baron’s sons.
