Conservative One America News is suing MSNBC's Rachel Maddow for more than $10 million after she called the conservative TV network 'paid Russian propaganda'.

The company - which describes itself as 'American as Apple Pie' - filed the defamation lawsuit against MSNBC and the host on Tuesday over the comments she made on her show on July 22.

The small, family-owned network based in San Diego has received favorable tweets from President Donald Trump and is challenging Fox News for conservative cable and satellite TV viewers.

The lawsuit states that Maddow's comment on 'The Rachel Maddow Show' were retaliation after OAN President Charles Herring accused cable television giant Comcast of censorship.

One America News filed the defamation lawsuit against MSNBC and host Rachel Maddow over the comments she made on her show on July 22 in which she called the network 'paid Russian propaganda'

OAN has received several favourable tweets from President Donald Trump

The suit contends that Comcast refused to carry the channel because it 'counters the liberal politics of Comcast's own news channel, MSNBC'.

A week after Herring sent an email to a Comcast executive, Maddow opened her show by referring to a report in the Daily Beast that said an OAN employee also worked for Sputnik News, which is linked to the Russian government.

'In this case, the most obsequiously pro-Trump right-wing news outlet in America really literally is paid Russian propaganda,' Maddow said.

In the lawsuit, OAN said Kristian Rouz was a freelancer for Sputnik News, not a staff employee, and his work there had nothing to do with his work for OAN

'Their on-air U.S. politics reporter is paid by the Russian government to produce propaganda for that government.'

In the lawsuit, OAN said Kristian Rouz was a freelancer for Sputnik News, not a staff employee, and his work there had nothing to do with his work for OAN.

The lawsuit noted that Rouz was born in the Ukraine and later moved to the U.S.

To make ends meet, he started writing articles for Sputnik in 2014 as a freelancer, according to the lawsuit.

While the lawsuit states that Sputnik is affiliated with the Russian government, it says that Rouz chose to write about 'various topics in global economics and international finance'.

The lawsuit includes a statement from Rouz that said he wrote some 1,300 articles over the past 4.5 years for Sputnik but said he was never a staff employee.

He said he was paid roughly $40 per article, which totaled about $11,500 per year.

'I have never written propaganda, disinformation, or unverified information,' he said.

The lawsuit states that OAN is owned and solely financed by an American company and says Maddow's claim that the network is paid Russian propaganda is 'false and intended to malign and harm' them.

The lawsuit states that Maddow's claim that the network is paid Russian propaganda is 'false and intended to malign and harm' them

'One America is wholly owned, operated and financed by the Herring family in San Diego. They are as American as apple pie. They are not paid by Russia and have nothing to do with the Russian government,' Skip Miller, an attorney representing OAN, said in a statement.

'This is a false and malicious libel and they're going to answer for it in a court of law.'

The suit names Maddow, Comcast, MSNBC and NBCUniversal Media.

A message seeking comment from an MSNBC spokeswoman was not immediately returned.

However, the lawsuit included an August 6 letter from Amy Wolf, an attorney for NBCUniversal News Group, to OAN's attorney.

It said OAN could not dispute that Sputnik was funded by the Russian government or that Rouz was employed by the conservative network.

'OAN, therefore, publishes content collected or created by a journalist who is also paid by the Russian government for writing over a thousand articles,' Wolf said.

'Ms Maddow's recounting of this arrangement is substantially true and therefore not actionable.'