Newsmax files suit against Fox News for using ‘exclusionary’ tactics to block competition

Antitrust lawsuit accuses the Murdoch-owned outlet of stifling competition in the rightwing TV news market

Newsmax, the conservative cable network run by Christopher Ruddy, has filed a lawsuit against Fox News, accusing the Rupert Murdoch-owned outlet of stifling competition in the rightwing television news market.

The antitrust lawsuit, filed on Wednesday in the US district court for the southern district of Florida, names both Fox News Network and its parent company, Fox Corp. It claims the broadcaster carried out “an exclusionary scheme to increase and maintain its dominance in the market for US right-leaning pay TV news”.

The complaint goes on: “Fox’s control over this must-have news channel gives it significant market power and leverage to impose onerous demands on distributors of its content. Fox leverages this market power to coerce distributors into not carrying or into marginalizing other right-leaning news channels, including Newsmax.”