MSNBC host Rachel Maddow might have cost the liberal network millions of dollars.
Alongside her colleagues Nicolle Wallace and Chris Hayes, Maddow is accused of making 39 "verifiably false" statements about a Georgia doctor who they dubbed the "Uterus Collector."
The hosts claimed that Dr. Mahendra Amin performed hysterectomies on women at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) center in 2020 based on a whistleblower account from a nurse named Dawn Wooten, who allegedly worked at the facility during the Trump Administration.
According to the 108-page summary published by Judge Lisa Godbey Wood of the Southern District of Georgia, Maddow and her MSNBC colleagues gave an on-air report after NBC reporters first published the story in September 2020 despite skepticism.
NBC acclaimed reporters Jacob Soboroff and Julia Ainsley claimed Amin's procedures were botched and unauthorized. However, court documents indicate that the doctor performed only two hysterectomies, both of which got the green light from ICE officials.
The plaintiff claims the two women signed informed consent forms for their procedures, but NBC argued that Amin performed the surgery without consent.
Maddow "initially questioned" the NBC reports, skeptical that the authors were "jumping to conclusions." However, she still covered the story during her weekly news segment.
NBC also published an article alleging gynecological abuse at the facility, which the plaintiff refutes.
Ben Osorio, the attorney for one ICDC detainee who had had a hysterectomy, told Ainsley that given "the allegations in the whistleblower report, [he was] questioning everything at that point."
"It was not the first Trump administration scandal. It was certainly, certainly, certainly not the last," Maddow opened her show on September 15, 2020, providing commentary on former President Donald Trump's "family separation policies and the then-Director of the Office of Refugee Resettlement."
"But the reason I'm bringing it all up again tonight is because now we have arrived at the next chapter in this same story. And I'm not going to dance around it. I'm just going to say it, and I guess we should have seen it coming, but still, it's a shock," she continued before reporting on Ainsley and Soboroff's story.
According to court documents, NBC standards deputy Christopher Scholl said the "department reviewed and approved reports even though the nurse provided "no evidence to back up her claims."
"[The whistleblower] has no direct knowledge of what she's claiming, is unable to name the doctor involved (if I understood correctly), and we are unable to verify any of it or determine whether there really is a story here," Scholl said in an email. "Essentially, it boils down to a single source — with an agenda — telling us things we have no basis to believe are true."
The court documents revealed that Ainsley and Soboroff had doubts about the story despite publishing it.
"[It doesn't] sound like they have much beyond the complaint," Soboroff texted Ainsley in September.
"Only two hysterectomies?" Ainsley reportedly replied.
Still, the NBC reporters published the article titled, "Lawyers allege abuse of migrant women by gynecologist for Georgia ICE detention center" the next day.
The judge ruled that "undisputed evidence has established" and "there were no mass hysterectomies or high numbers of hysterectomies at the facility."
"The Court must look to each of the statements in the context of the entire broadcast or social media post to assess the construction placed upon it by the average viewer," the judge wrote. "Viewed in their entirety, the September 15, 2020 episodes of 'Deadline: White House,' 'All In With Chris Hayes,' and 'The Rachel Maddow Show' accuse Plaintiff of performing mass hysterectomies on detainee women. It does not matter that NBC did not make these accusations directly but only republished the whistleblower letter's allegations. If accusations against a plaintiff are 'based entirely on hearsay,' '[t]he fact that the charges made were based upon hearsay in no manner relieves the defendant of liability. Charges based upon hearsay are the equivalent in law to direct charges.'"
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