From The roots of Rupert Murdoch family succession feud | Australian Story documentary · · ABC News In-depth
“As Australians we are free to have our own opinions; we should reject every effort to limit points of view, to obstruct a diversity of opinions and to enforce a singular worldview.”
On , Lachlan Murdoch, Executive Chairman & CEO at Fox Corporation (Class A), spoke about free speech during The roots of Rupert Murdoch family succession feud | Australian Story documentary on ABC News In-depth.
Lachlan Murdoch, executive chairman and CEO of Fox Corporation, has been the subject of a three-part Australian Story documentary series examining his role in the Murdoch family's succession dispute. In the documentary, Murdoch described the family as "a very close family" and said "we actually are a normal family, we just have a bit of a spotlight on us." Journalist Paddy Manning, who is featured in the documentary, characterized Murdoch as someone who "wins the crown" but "finds himself estranged from his family." Court records from the Dominion Voting Systems defamation lawsuit against Fox News showed that Murdoch was "cheering for Donald Trump" on election night 2020, according to the documentary, which also reported that Murdoch and his father became "increasingly uncomfortable with countering Trump because the fox audience was tuning out." In a March 2022 speech launching the Centre for the Australian Way of Life at the Institute of Public Affairs, Murdoch criticized COVID-19 lockdown measures, saying "who would have believed that in Australia a pregnant mother would be arrested for questioning a government lockdown." He also criticized tech platforms for content moderation, stating that YouTube "banned Sky News Australia based on YouTube's own judgments and changing standards about a handful of pandemic related videos." Murdoch described himself as "conservative economically" and "more liberal on social policy," and said "when people tell me to think a certain way... I'm more inclined to think a different way."