Newsmax Files Antitrust Lawsuit Against Fox News

Newsmax has filed an antitrust lawsuit against Fox News, claiming that it has maintained its dominance among right-leaning cable networks via an “exclusionary scheme” to suppress competition.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Florida on Wednesday, also names Fox Corporation as a defendant.

Newsmax claimed that Fox “employs at least three anticompetitive means to exclude competing providers of right-leaning video content from the market.” They include “explicit or tacit” “no carry” provisions on distributors that condition access on concessions not to carry other right-leaning news channels like Newsmax.

The lawsuit also claimed that Fox imposes penalties on distributors if they carry other right-leaning news channels by requiring them to pay high fees for lesser watched networks like Fox News. Newsmax also claimed that Fox “inserts a suite of other contractual barriers into its carriage agreements intended to prevent Newsmax and others from competing,” characterizing Fox as having an “unlawful monopolization” of the right-leaning pay-TV news market.

The lawsuit claimed that Fox’s “anticompetitve behavior” has resulted in “significant damages to Newsmax, including in the form of lost business, missed advertising and marketing revenues, and lower cable license fees, all while increasing overall company costs. Newsmax is far from the only victim.”

Read Newsmax’s lawsuit against Fox News.

A Fox News spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment.