Jenna Ellis, the Salem Media host who served as one of Donald Trump’s 2020 campaign attorneys,
pleaded guilty on Tuesday to a felony charge of aiding and abetting false statements in the Georgia election subversion case. Her plea deal, the third in the last week, followed those from notorious election conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell and fake electors artist Kenneth Chesebro.The rapid succession of guilty pleas not only marks a big blow to Trump, but also to the right-wing media apparatus that championed and disseminated his election lies to the masses. In the aftermath of the 2020 election, both Ellis and Powell toured across MAGA Media, becoming heroes to Trump’s fans as they sowed doubt about the legitimacy of the election. Now they’re confessing to the public that they were wrong all along. In a tearful statement read aloud in court on Tuesday, Ellis admitted that she failed to actually understand the facts of the 2020 election and said she looked back on her actions contesting the results “with deep remorse.”
Fox News
paid a historic $787 million settlement to Dominion Voting Systems earlier this year for airing and repeating some of the same corrosive lies that are now prompting guilty pleas in a Fulton County courtroom. Despite talking a big game about their legal prospects out of court, Fox’s attorneys struggled to make their case before a judge and Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch ultimately moved to settle the blockbuster defamation lawsuit at the eleventh hour to avoid an embarrassing — and potentially even more costly — trial.