U.S. District Judge Aileen Cannon
A federal court has dismissed a lawsuit by Newsmax Broadcasting alleging that Fox Corp. engages in anticompetitive conduct and coercive tactics to keep distributors from carrying Fox’s competitors, such as Newsmax and One America News Network.
Newsmax filed the lawsuit Sept. 3 in the Southern District of Florida, but Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed the complaint without prejudice two days later, meaning that an amended complaint can be refiled. Cannon concluded Newsmax’s lawsuit against Fox, which is the dominant conservative news outlet, represented an impermissible “shotgun pleading.”
Such lawsuits are rejected because they can be disorganized and lack clarity. In Newsmax’s case, Cannon found that the counts two through five in the complaint each incorporate charges contained in the preceding complaint. In effect, the final complaint reads as a combination of the entire complaint, according to the judge’s order.
“Plaintiff may file an amended complaint that is consistent with this order on or before Sept. 11, 2025,” Cannon said. “The amended complaint must not contain any successive counts that incorporate all other allegations.”
The lawsuit alleges that Fox violated the Sherman Act, a federal antitrust law, as well as two Florida statutes, the Florida Antitrust Act and the Deceptive & Unfair Trade Practices Act.
“Fox Corp. has long engaged in an exclusionary scheme to increase and maintain its dominance in the market for U.S. right-leaning pay TV news, resulting in suppression of competition in that market that harms consumers, competition and Newsmax Broadcasting,” the complaint says.
A Newsmax spokesperson told the Florida Record that the litigation would continue.
“We understand this is just a technical matter and our law firm is refiling,” the spokesperson said in an emailed statement.
Fox uses three methods to keep competitors out of the right-leaning news market, according to Newsmax. These include forcing distributors of Fox content to abide by a “no-carry” arrangement whereby distributors are allowed to give their viewers access to Fox content provided they do not carry competitor channels like Newsmax, according to the lawsuit.
Fox also levies financial penalties against carriers that air Newsmax’s programs by charging high fees for Fox’s less popular channels such as Fox Business, the complaint says, in addition to imposing contractual barriers that put Newsmax and other outlets at a disadvantage.
“Fox’s control over (its) must-have news channel gives it significant market power and leverage to impose onerous demands on distributors of its content,” the lawsuit says. “Fox leverages this market power to coerce distributors into not carrying or into marginalizing other right-leaning news channels, including Newsmax.”
The complaint alleges that the anticompetitive actions occur with traditional cable operators as well as newer virtual distributors, including YouTube TV and Sling TV.
Cable companies have condemned Fox for past actions employing “bad faith negotiating tactics,” according to the complaint. These tactics include threatened blackouts of sports events and telling customers to switch content providers, the lawsuit says.
The complaint seeks a jury trial, a court declaration that Fox violates the terms of the specified state and federal laws, three times the amount of damages sustained by Newsmax, an injunction barring Fox’s “exclusionary agreements” and reasonable attorney fees.
