One America News Network’s proprietor misplaced a key ruling in a lawsuit towards DirecTV over the TV supplier’s resolution to drop OAN from its channel lineup. OAN-owner Herring Networks had sued DirecTV and its proprietor AT&T in March 2022, claiming breach of contract.
The lawsuit at all times appeared like an uphill battle for Herring Networks as a result of DirecTV did not take OAN off the air whereas they nonetheless had a carriage settlement. Instead, DirecTV waited till the carriage settlement expired and selected to not renew it.
Most of OAN’s claims have been thrown out in a ruling issued final week by Judge John Meyer of California Superior Court in San Diego County. DirecTV had filed an anti-SLAPP (strategic lawsuits towards public participation) movement to strike the Herring Networks criticism; DirecTV’s movement was granted partly and denied partly.
“As to the breach of the implied covenant declare, to the extent it’s primarily based on the non-renewal of the Affiliation Agreement, the declare fails as a result of the settlement accommodates a set expiration date and no provision entitling Herring to a renewal,” the ruling mentioned.
DirecTV: “We’ve anticipated this positive outcome”
Meyer issued the opinion on Thursday as a “tentative ruling,” then held a five-minute listening to on Friday. A Times of San Diego report mentioned that on the listening to, “three Herring attorneys and 5 representing the defendants went together with a tentative ruling issued Thursday evening.”
We contacted Herring Networks in regards to the ruling and can replace this text if we get a response.
DirecTV mentioned it anticipated the ruling in its favor. “While we have anticipated this constructive final result, we’re happy the decide has dominated in our favor and stricken OAN’s central claims relating to our resolution to not renew a industrial settlement with the programmer,” DirecTV mentioned in an announcement supplied to Ars. (AT&T accomplished a spinoff of DirecTV in 2021 however nonetheless owns 70 % of the satellite tv for pc supplier.)
The one Herring Networks declare that survived the ruling is an allegation that DirecTV violated a confidentiality settlement by publicly disclosing the expiration date of the OAN carriage contract. Herring “adequately alleged a breach of the confidentiality provision” and “would at a minimal be entitled to nominal damages” if it wins on that declare at trial, the decide wrote.
The ruling’s conclusion mentioned, “The courtroom strikes all claims, apart from the breach of contract declare to the extent that declare is premised on DirecTV disclosing the expiration date of the present Affiliation Agreement.”
While Herring Networks “has fended off an effort to kill its breach-of-contract swimsuit” totally, the ruling means it “may be out of luck claiming a loss ‘exceeding $1 billion,'” the Times of San Diego wrote.
OAN slammed for “election fraud lies”
Herring’s criticism towards DirecTV and AT&T mentioned the lawsuit is an try “to redress the unchecked affect and energy that Defendants have wielded in an try to unlawfully destroy an unbiased, family-run enterprise and impede the appropriate of American tv viewers to look at the information media channels and applications of their alternative.”
DirecTV introduced the choice to drop OAN in January 2022 amid strain from advocacy teams. Media Matters, Free Press, and different teams had written a letter to AT&T and DirecTV saying that OAN “is a serious supporter of the Stop the Steal motion and is at the moment being sued by Dominion for spreading election fraud lies that claimed the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump.” The teams’ letter additionally mentioned OAN “stok[ed] violent requires the assault on the US Capitol” and airs “wall-to-wall COVID-19 disinformation.”
OAN host Dan Ball referred to as the DirecTV nonrenewal “censorship at its greatest” and urged viewers to “name AT&T’s help line. Complain, elevate hell, e-mail, cellphone name day by day, each hour, set the alarm in your cellphone, blow the cellphone strains up, demand they hold OAN.”
OAN would later lose its final main TV distributor, Verizon FiOS. But the DirecTV nonrenewal was the most damaging to OAN financially.
Herring Networks misplaced an try to halt the defamation lawsuit filed by voting-machine firm Dominion. In a November 2022 ruling in US District Court for the District of Columbia, Judge Carl Nichols denied Herring’s movement to dismiss the case.
Herring was additionally sued for alleged defamation by voting-machine firm Smartmatic in a separate case being heard by the identical decide. Herring misplaced a movement to dismiss that case as nicely.