> When Hunter Bidens damning laptop was discovered late in the election cycle, nearly all mainstream news sources ignored it [...] Today it is quietly acknowledged that the story was true
To be clear, it turned out to be true that it was Hunter Biden's laptop. It did not turn out to be true that it contained anything damning concerning Joe Biden.
> Earlier this year, ABCs anchor George Stephanopolous was sued by Trump after he repeatedly called Trump a rapist, a false charge. ABC settled, paying $16m.
To be clear, the problem wasn't that Stephanopolous said that Trump was a rapist. It was that he said that Trump had been found liable for the rape E Jean Carroll in her lawsuit against him. In fact Trump was found by the jury to be liable for sexually abusing her but not for raping her.
However, in Trump's counterclaim against Carroll for defamation because she repeatedly claimed he raped her the judge dismissed the claim saying that her words were "substantially true". He said "The only issue on which the jury did not find in Ms Carroll’s favor was whether she proved that Mr Trump ‘raped’ her within the narrow, technical meaning of that term in the New York penal law".
The jury had been instructed that it could only find the Trump "raped" her if he forcibly penetrated her vagina with his penis. Forcible penetration by fingers is not rape under the New York penal code.
The judge noted that in contexts outside of New York penal law that would commonly be called "rape". BTW, that's also the case in the law of most other US states.
> Likewise, Trump sued 60 Minutes for editing a Kamala Harris interview to improve her responses to a question. CBS settled by paying Trump.
The overwhelming majority of legal experts considered that to be a frivolous lawsuit. Paramount (CBS' parent company) settled because they needed government approval for a merger they were involved in. The government approved the merger 3 weeks after the settlement.