Fox News’s Sean Hannity demanded that the New York Times issue an apology and retract a number of stories that negatively reflect on his coverage of the coronavirus.
Lawyers for Hannity, 58, sent a letter to the paper’s legal counsel and the columnists who wrote the pertinent stories on Monday. The letter alleged that the three columns that criticized the prime-time opinion host were factually inaccurate and thus libelous and defamatory.
“Your publication of the above false and defamatory statements constitutes libel,” the letter from Hannity’s lawyer read. “A statement that carries a false implication is defamatory where ‘the language of the communication as a whole can be reasonably read both to impart a defamatory inference and to affirmatively suggest that the author intended or endorsed that inference.'”
Most recently, the New York Times published “A Beloved Bar Owner Was Skeptical About the Virus. Then He Took a Cruise,” which told the story of Joe Joyce, a Brooklyn bar owner and Fox News viewer who went on a cruise to Spain in March. The writer, Ginia Bellafante, linked Joyce’s death from COVID-19 to Hannity’s coverage.
The Fox News personality took exception with the column because his remarks quoted in the story were said a week after Joyce had left for his trip. On his show shortly after the story was published, Hannity alleged the writer “pretty much all but accused yours truly of murder.”
Hannity also took issue with a piece written by Kara Swisher last month, titled “Fox’s Fake News Contagion.” It began with an explicit note that the writer had no interest in suing Hannity before alleging that Fox News’s early coverage of the pandemic made her mother believe the virus was being “overblown by the mainstream news media.”
Hannity rebuked the piece and repeatedly castigated Swisher on social media. He also found another piece, written last month by Ben Smith, to be an unfair representation of Fox News as a whole. The piece specifically questioned Lachlan Murdoch, the chief executive of the Fox Corporation, for not doing more to make sure the network’s opinion hosts were reporting accurate information.
“We demand that you promptly remove the foregoing false and defamatory statements from the Stories and any subsequent republications in print or any other medium, and publish a full, fair and conspicuous retraction, correction and apology as to each of the false and defamatory statements identified above, with as prominent placement as the original statements,” the letter from Hannity’s lawyer read.
The letter also alleged that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Dr. Anthony Fauci, and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio were all guilty of downplaying the virus during its early stages.
Hannity’s lawyers warned that they’d pursue “immediate legal proceedings against” the newspaper if it didn’t “retract, correct and apologize” within 24 hours of receiving the correspondence.
“We have reported fairly and accurately on Mr. Hannity,” Eileen Murphy, a New York Times spokeswoman, told the Washington Examiner after publication. “There is no basis for a retraction or an apology.”
