Viet Dinh, Fox’s Influential General Counsel, To Exit

variety.com:

Brian Steinberg Senior TV Editor Viet Dinh, the influential general counsel of Fox Corp. who is believed to have played a significant role in the company’s failed legal strategy against a massive defamation suit filed against it by Dominion Voting Systems, is leaving his role at the media conglomerate at the end of the year.

He is expected to become a special advisor to the company effective December 31, 2023. “We appreciate Viet’s many contributions and service to Fox as both a board member of 21st Century Fox and in his role over the last five years as a valued member of Fox’s leadership team,” said Lachlan Murdoch, Fox’s executive chairman and CEO, in a statement.

Dinh has long been perceived as having a role at Fox that is greater than his title. In January of 2021, then-New York Times media columnist Ben Smith called Dinh ”a kind of regent who mostly runs the company day-to-day.” The FT subsequently reported that Dinh “is making decisions on behalf of Lachlan.” In a March interview that year with David Lat, writer of the Substack newsletter “Original Jurisdiction,” Dinh pushed back at the notion that he had undue control over Fox Corp.

affairs. “To ascribe any role to me other than my day job, which is overseeing legal, regulatory, and government affairs, is not only false, it would mean I have far more time than I actually do,” Dinh said in the interview. “Lachlan hired me for what is very much a full-time job, which I can barely manage to do with 24 hours in the day.” Dinh was believed to have pushed Fox to fight the recent Dominion defamation suit, which alleged the voting technology company was owed millions after Fox News aired false claims about its actions and influence on the 2020 election.