A member of the Dominion Voting Systems’ legal team says even with the $787.5 million settlement with Fox News, the decision is still “a victory for the American people.”

Rod Smolla was recruited to be part of the Dominion legal team from the very beginning as an expert on defamation and libel law.

The president of the Vermont Law and Graduate School in Burlington, Vt., he has authored such books as “Suing the Press: Libel, the Media, and Power”; “Jerry Falwell v. Larry Flynt: The First Amendment on Trial”; and, “Deliberate Intent: A Lawyer Tells the True Story of Murder by the Book”, which was made into a television movie by FX, with Timothy Hutton playing the role of Smolla.

“I was the only lawyer for defending the motion to dismiss the case if Fox tried to get the case tossed out right at the beginning,” he said during a Friday morning interview. “And then we were successful in defeating that. A few weeks ago, I was one of the three Dominion lawyers that argued on the motion for summary judgment. And when the judge granted that that paved the way for the drama of the last week.”

He said that Dominion’s goal from the outset was to “repair its reputation, because if local officials thought that these machines were in some ways, corrupted, it would be devastating to the business.”

It was also part of the plan to correct the public record.

“This was one of the biggest lies in American history, said Smolla.” This was really damaging to our democracy, Dominion’s whole business is to help facilitate well-run elections and the notion that this election was stolen was terrible for the country. And I think, just as much as Dominion wanted to vindicate its business interests, it wanted to set the record straight and get an adjudication as to where the truth really was.”

Some observers were not surprised that Fox settled out-of-court. What did surprise many is how long it took to reach the settlement.

“I don’t know how to get ahead of the people that are running Fox and the settlement at the end was Fox finally facing reality,” said Smolla. “After the judge had ruled that, absolutely, there was no truth to anything that was said … once we have this discovery that they knew the stories were false and didn’t do anything about it. They had to know that the writing was on the wall and that they were exposed to a lot of liability.

“As to why they let it last so long. It’s hard to know but I will say it’s not so unusual that I’ve seen this many times,” he continued. “There’s nothing like the pressure of the events and the reality that sets in when you are in that courtroom. Proceedings are commencing and I think as the government got within days of the trial and the trial itself, that just increases pressure. There are cases that settle on the courthouse steps as to juries being paneled all the time.”

The biggest disappointment may have been in the Dominion lawyers that were prepared for opening arguments, even to the point of placing the microphones on their lapels.

“They had everything ready,” said Smolla. “You know, on one hand, the suspense was taken away and would be like settling the Super Bowl before the start. But on the other hand, it was such a powerful victory. The hugeness of the settlement, and the clarity of the judge’s opinion made it a tremendous victory. So I think Dominion feels that Fox was held accountable and they were completely vindicated and was thrilled with the result. But trial lawyers love to be in court.”

One of the hardest parts of any defamation case is proving actual malice. Yet, Smolla said that was accomplished.

“It was a slam dunk. I know the proof was overwhelming. I’ve never seen qualitatively and quantitatively, such convincing proof of actual malice. I think that the Dominion knew it was going to win a liability. I think it would be almost impossible imagine it wouldn’t win. The only question mark was what the amount of damage.”

There have been a great many words given in disappointment to the fact that Fox was not required to admit accountability in the settlement. Many in the public sphere wanted to see Rupert Murdoch, Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity and others take the stand and try to defend their actions. Did Dominion have a responsibility to make sure that a pound of flesh was extracted from Fox?

“$787 million is a lot of accountability,” reminded Smolla. “As I’ve already said, all of those witnesses were already deposed, and the things they had to say, plus the things that were in their emails and their text messages, all of that is in the public. And, what would have happened at trial would have been suspenseful, would have been dramatic, but not different substantively what has been what has already happened? So I appreciate everybody loves a dramatic trial. Everybody loves the suspense. But don’t confuse suspense with accountability. And I think that Fox was held accountable.”

The next case in the pipeline against Fox belongs to Smartmatic USA, another voting systems manufacturer. It filed its defamation lawsuit against Fox for spreading false claims that its voting software helped rig the 2020 election and specifically names Fox hosts Maria Bartiromo, Jeanine Pirro and former host Lou Dobbs.

“Dominion’s litigation exposed some of the misconduct and damage caused by Fox’s disinformation campaign,” Smartmatic’s attorney Erik Connolley said in a statement Tuesday after the Dominion settlement was announced.

I agree (that Smartmatic has a roadmap) and this Smartmatic litigation was proceeding, really on a parallel track with the litigation in Delaware, and Delaware courts are just faster. But there had already been rulings in the Smartmatic court in New York, similar to ours. And so legally, they’re in a very similar position. As an outsider, it strikes me as there has to be tremendous pressure on Fox to try to settle that case. And I wouldn’t be surprised it’s still on a much slower track so they’re not under the same type of pressure that we were in the Delaware case.”

Smolla said that he disagreed with those who felt the the media’s First Amendment rights could be damaged by a jury decision with a torrent of new defamation cases to come.

“I think, perhaps counter intuitively, it would have reinforced the First Amendment protections that honest journalists have,” he said. “There has been a discourse in the last few years about whether the First Amendment protections are too small, and whether they should be dialed back. Supreme Court justices Clarence Thomas and Neil Gorsuch have been suggesting that that should happen. And that, I think, has been very worrisome to the outputs. Part of the narrative was the actual malice standard is so difficult that plaintiffs can never win. (This) shows you they can win and they can win big. The key is discovery. If you can get to the text messages, the emails, the discussions behind the scenes, you can build the case. So I actually think it reinforces the First Amendment protections rather than the opposite.

“I think it’s a victory for the American people,” he concluded. “I think it’s a victory for all the voices of rationality that said the election was not stolen. It is, of course, a victory for Dominion and for the future of its business. But most importantly, it’s a big victory for truth. And for that, and for rule of law, the idea that you can have a civilized forum in which truth really matters, and somebody can tell the difference between truth and falsity. You can’t just say we have the one get away with it. So I think it’s been a victory for the system and a victory for the country.”

The only downside? Will the decision have any impact on those who truly believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen?

“I doubt it. I think that there’s a segment that just of our culture that’s in denial, and will claim that the election was stolen and, if there are future losses, that they’ve been stolen, without regard or any evidence,” he said. “I feel badly about that. There will always be a group that feels that way and things like this will have no impact on what those folks believe.”