Want the inside scoop on the "secret" Murdoch family legal battle that isn't such a secret anymore? We hate to disappoint, but you might be in the dark for a while. Patriarch Rupert Murdoch, 93, appears set on leaving his media empire, which includes Fox News and the Wall Street Journal, in the hands of his oldest son, Lachlan, even though his other kids don't want that—but it's a fight that's going to play out behind closed doors, after a Nevada judge ruled this week that the billionaire's attempts to rewrite his irrevocable family trust are to stay confidential, per NBC News.
"A family trust like the one at issue in this case, even when it is a stockholder in publicly traded companies, is essentially a private legal arrangement, as the applicable sealing statutes recognize," the judge from the Second Judicial District Court in Reno wrote Thursday. In doing so, the judge rejected a petition by a half-dozen or so news groups—including CNN, the Washington Post, Reuters, and the New York Times—to unseal all pertinent documents in the case, per CNN. The news organizations have argued that "the fate of the Murdoch family's enormous fortune and vast media empire is a matter of immense public interest," per NBC.
In July, the Times published an article based on a sealed court document it got its hands on, revealing that Rupert Murdoch wants to amend the current trust—which hands power to Lachlan and three other children, James, Elisabeth, and Prudence—so that the reportedly more conservative Lachlan can handle the family business "without interference from his more politically moderate siblings." Rupert Murdoch apparently fears such interference and "lack of consensus" could hurt the business overall.
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This week, one of Murdoch's own properties is also reporting on the "family rift" that's been compared to the HBO show Succession, with an anecdote tied to another big name who once inserted himself into the drama. Per the Wall Street Journal, actor Robert De Niro confronted Elisabeth Murdoch at a 2022 dinner over why she wasn't more vocal on what he saw as Fox News' "corrosive impact on political discourse," per the outlet. "You can still love your father, but you can tell him he is wrong for what he is doing to this country," De Niro says he told her. The paper notes Elisabeth "was visibly shaken after the conversation, and the actor later apologized." More on that here. (More Rupert Murdoch stories.)
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