The People of Utah vs. Kevin O’Leary
On the morning of May 11th, the celebrity investor Kevin O’Leary appeared on Fox Business and announced that he was under attack by Chinese agents. For weeks, he had been going on TV and posting online to tout his project, called Wonder Valley, after his nickname from the reality show Shark Tank, Mr. Wonderful. It […]
On May 11th, Kevin O’Leary, a celebrity investor, appeared on Fox Business and claimed he was under attack by Chinese agents. O’Leary had been promoting his project, Wonder Valley, a massive data center with 40,000 acres north of Great Salt Lake in Box Elder County, Utah. The project was expected to generate 9 gigawatts of electricity, more than double the state's average consumption.
O’Leary stated that Utah's leadership and legislators had approved the project rapidly, suggesting it showed they weren't backing down from China. However, after the approval, O’Leary observed a sudden increase in online criticism and questioned who could want the project stopped. He accused China of being responsible and launched an investigation into the IP addresses of critics.
Six weeks later, Fox News Media issued a retraction, stating they had no evidence of any connection between the project and China. O’Leary and Fox were subsequently sued for defamation by local officials and residents, including Alliance for a Better Utah, Elevate Strategies, Gabrielle Finlayson, and Joshua Kanter.
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