Nevins is co-publisher of The Fulcrum and co-founder and board chairman of the Bridge Alliance Education Fund.
At first when I heard the news of the unprecedented settlement in the Fox News defamation case of nearly $800 million I hoped this was a victory for democracy.
This is the first time anyone has been held accountable for the lies and deception that has resulted in 70% of Republicans believing that the presidential election of 2020 was a fraud and that Donald Trump actually won.
Yet despite the financial accountability, costing nearly $800 million and the innocuous statement that Fox News made as part of the settlement deal stating that, “We acknowledge the Court’s rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false,” they are not required to make any retraction or apology, much less exhibit any remorse. Thus it is unlikely that the Fox News marketing strategy of spinning news to what their audience desires will change.
At 4:00 p.m. shortly after the settlement announcement, all the other networks and the news websites, not affiliated with Fox News reported on the settlement in great detail as the lead story. It wasn’t until several hours later that in what amounted to roughly 6 minutes of coverage that it was even mentioned on Fox News. At 4:00 p.m., The Five show on Fox News in one full hour didn’t even mention the settlement. At 5:00 p.m. during Bret Baier’s one hour show on Fox News the story was still not mentioned. It wasn’t until four hours after the announcement that Fox.news.com finally made mention of the settlement.
Fox News is the top-rated cable network, averaging 2.5 million viewers in prime time, yet these viewers will hear virtually nothing in what is a critically important story that impacts the future of our democracy. Unless, of course, they watch other news, too.
By definition failing to tell the full story about the largest public defamation case of all time, a settlement that paid Dominion six times the current value of the company, while technically not a lie, is a lie of omission with serious consequences for the future.
It is important for Americans to understand that there is no America without democracy, no democracy without voting, and no informed voting without respectful debate. Unfortunately, unless advertisers stop supporting Fox News a vast swath of the American public will not learn the truth about the election of 2020 and our democracy will suffer.
During this trying time for our democracy, The Fulcrum takes our responsibility more seriously than ever to keep our audience informed so they can collectively learn and then act to repair our democracy and make it live and work in our everyday lives. The people and organizations we cover represent all walks of life, political parties, races, identities, and religions. It is our responsibility to raise the voices of Americans who believe that what we have in common is stronger than what separates us, and to encourage them to act with conviction.
We, the people, are stronger if we work together with the full understanding that we won’t agree on everything. And that’s the point. Democracy is a process for managing disagreements, sharing power and providing consent of the governed. Fox News owes their viewers more.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
____
Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.