Did Fox Corporation or News Corp make Democratic corporate donations in 2020-2024?
Executive summary
Both Fox Corporation and News Corp have, via their political action committees and affiliated employee/owner contributions, given money to some Democratic politicians during the 2020–2024 period; those donations were small relative to overall giving and in several instances were returned or voided, while reporting shows the PACs have historically split contributions across party lines [1] [2] [3] [4].
1. What “corporate donations” means here — PACs, employees, and corporate limits
Corporations cannot directly contribute to federal candidates, so disclosures of corporate political activity in the sources are largely about corporate PACs or contributions made by employees, executives and owners which are reported and tracked by organizations like OpenSecrets [5] [4] [6]. The reporting about Fox Corp and News Corp in 2020–2024 therefore centers on their PACs’ disclosed contributions and on filings showing which candidates received money from those PACs or from company-affiliated donors [7] [8].
2. Fox Corporation: documented Democratic recipients and voided checks
Fox Corp’s PAC did make at least one documented contribution to a Democrat in the period covered by reporting: a $1,500 contribution to Sen. Joe Manchin’s 2024 reelection campaign, disclosed to the Federal Election Commission and reported by CNBC [1]. Business Insider reported that Fox Corp’s PAC had reported five contributions to Democratic congressional campaigns as “void” in 2022, indicating either the campaigns rejected the money or the PAC rescinded the payments [2]. OpenSecrets’ analyses cited by news outlets also show the PAC’s giving in earlier cycles was split between parties — for example, roughly even in 2019–2020 — signaling selective, pragmatic Democratic gifts rather than a wholesale shift in partisan giving [2] [4].
3. News Corp: PAC activity that reached Democrats
News Corp’s PAC has likewise donated to both Republicans and Democrats in recent cycles; reporting and analysis demonstrated that contributions from News Corp’s PAC flowed to Democratic candidates in the same broader timeframe, and the company spokesman emphasized that PAC activity is publicly disclosed [3] [6]. Forbes highlighted that Murdoch-linked corporate PACs had supported Democratic and Republican figures during 2021, underscoring that at least some News Corp–affiliated political spending benefited Democrats [3].
4. Scale, context and corporate motives — small amounts, strategic targets
The dollar amounts reported for individual Democratic recipients have been modest in the available coverage — for example the $1,500 to Manchin [1] — and earlier OpenSecrets summaries show Fox Corp’s federal-level candidate contributions in a cycle totaled in the low hundreds of thousands while split between parties [2] [4]. Coverage suggests these donations are often strategic: to moderate or pivotal lawmakers (as with Manchin) or to candidates where corporate relationships or regulatory stakes make bipartisan giving pragmatic, not ideological [1] [2].
5. Disputes, returns and the limits of the record
There are documented instances where Democratic committees rejected or returned Fox PAC contributions — Business Insider reported five voided contributions totaling $12,500 in 2022 [2] — and OpenSecrets’ organization profiles caution that reporting tracks PAC activity and affiliated individual giving but does not equate to direct corporate checks [5] [4]. The available reporting does not provide a complete dollar-for-dollar ledger of every 2020–2024 contribution by these entities; therefore, while the evidence confirms that both Fox Corp and News Corp PACs or affiliated donors gave to some Democrats in the period, the full universe of small or state-level gifts requires consulting FEC and OpenSecrets raw filings for exhaustive accounting [7] [8].
6. Bottom line
The evidence in the cited reporting confirms that both Fox Corporation (via its PAC and affiliated donors) and News Corp (via its PAC) made some contributions to Democratic candidates between 2020 and 2024, though the amounts documented in mainstream reporting were generally small, sometimes voided or returned, and the PACs’ overall giving has historically been split or strategically targeted rather than uniformly partisan [1] [2] [3] [4].