Topline

Dominion Voting Systems on Friday suggested MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell’s voter fraud theories helped to breed lingering distrust about last year’s election, linking his claims to a contentious election audit in Arizona, in the latest filing in a $1.3 billion defamation suit against Lindell.

Key Facts

Dominion is suing Lindell and MyPillow for defamation, claiming he severely damaged the voting machine company’s reputation by spreading false allegations of vote-rigging, in what Dominion cast as a ploy to boost sales for his as-seen-on-TV pillow business.

MyPillow has asked a judge to dismiss Dominion’s lawsuit, arguing in part that Lindell isn’t alone in questioning voting machines: The company pointed to the Arizona audit, concerns about Dominion raised by politicians and a recent poll about voter fraud.

But in a reply filed Friday, Dominion suggested Lindell helped fuel this widespread suspicion about the election, setting the stage for Republicans in Arizona to launch an unusual and widely criticized audit of Maricopa County’s ballots this year.

Dominion noted one of the leaders of the Arizona audit repeated voter fraud allegations on Twitter last year, some of which resembled claims Lindell has made.

Dominion also said Lindell acted with reckless disregard for the truth — which is the minimum legal standard to prove defamation against a public figure — because his claims about vote-rigging were “so inherently improbable that only a reckless person would have published them” and were publicly contradicted by federal officials.

Crucial Quote

“Plainly, such materials [about the Arizona audit] reflect the damage that Defendants helped cause; they do not retroactively provide a factual basis for Defendants to have made inherently improbable claims in the first place,” Dominion wrote Friday.

Chief Critic

Lindell told Forbes he rejected the notion that people distrust the election because of him and argued he wasn’t the first person to level accusations about Dominion, pointing to rumors about the company’s voting machines from early November of last year. Still, he acknowledged that he later became one of the most well-known proponents of voter fraud theories. He also told Forbes he’s supportive of the Arizona audit but hasn’t personally donated to the effort.

Key Background

For months, Lindell has zealously argued last year’s presidential election was stolen from former President Donald Trump. He’s repeated an array of wild voter fraud allegations, some of which involve Dominion. Election security experts have widely dismissed these unproven claims and called last year’s election secure. But despite the pushback, Lindell has insisted he has proof of vote manipulation, telling Forbes he still expects the Supreme Court to reinstate Trump as president by August at the latest.

Tangent

Lindell isn’t the only Trump ally to face legal troubles for backing voter fraud allegations. Former Trump campaign attorneys Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, as well as Fox News, are facing defamation lawsuits from both Dominion and its competitor Smartmatic.

Surprising Fact

MyPillow filed its own lawsuit against Dominion last month, accusing the company of spreading false information about MyPillow.

Further Reading

Dominion Voting Sues MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell For Defamation Over Election Conspiracy (Forbes)