As we reported in February, Dominion Voting Systems is suing Mike Lindell and MyPillow for $1.3 billion for defamation. Now, in a new filing, Dominion is focused on going after the company itself –- deeper pockets, of course –- by arguing that MyPillow is liable for Mike Lindell’s allegations about them.

I’m not a lawyer, but it seems to me that Lindell was speaking very much as an individual when he made allegations about the lack of security surrounding the Dominion voting machines. He’s definitely a man on a mission, and I’m not talking about the mission of selling pillows, sheets and mattress toppers. Yet Dominion is arguing that this is really just about selling lots of bedding –- that Lindell has been waging a “defamatory marketing campaign” in his capacity as “the MyPillow guy.” They say he’s “integrating bogus election fraud claims with an extensive marketing campaign for the pillow company.” They couldn't be more wrong.

They point to his online store, in which he uses promo codes such as “FightForTrump.” My thought is that if Lindell is appealing to his right-wing clientele, it’s because he’s had to say goodbye to just about all of his other clientele over the election issue. I would assume that conservative Trump-supporters are pretty much all he’s got left.

“The law is clear that corporations can be held liable for the defamatory statements their employees make within the scope of their employment and furtherance of the company’s business,” their attorneys wrote. They argued that a jury could infer that Lindell was acting as the company’s agent and “exploited lies about Dominion to market MyPillow products.”

Lindell, however, had already claimed to have lost tens of millions of dollars in retail partnerships. Recall that major retailers such as Bed, Bath & Beyond and Kohl’s discontinued his products. MyPillow has also said in its own defense that Lindell sincerely believed his claims.

Lindell had asked the judge in the case, U.S. District Judge Carl John Richards, to dismiss Dominion’s lawsuit against him. But with this latest filing, Dominion is now asking him to move their suit forward.

What has bothered me about Dominion, and still does, is that they insist they have “publicly available facts and evidence” disproving the claims against them, and that the statements against Dominion have been “rebutted by the evidence,” while refusing to turn such evidence over to auditors. For example, they continue to withhold the administrative passwords for the machines used in Maricopa County, Arizona, to those who are currently conducting the audit there. My understanding is that these passwords would enable auditors to thoroughly investigate whether or not the machines are hackable and might have contributed to a rigged election. Dominion is trying to have it both ways: deny the charges but withhold their evidence.

It’s challenging to find stories in the news about Lindell and his claims that don’t dismiss them out of hand and call them false and “debunked.” To date, no one has debunked them. If you read this story in BUSINESS INSIDER, keep in mind that there’s some editorializing, such as the statement that “Lindell has continued to levy falsehoods against Dominion in interviews and rallies.” The accuracy of Lindell’s claims is yet to be determined. So, who’s defaming whom?

https://www.businessinsider.com/dominion-says-mypillow-liable-mike-lindell-election-falsehoods-defamation-lawsuit-2021-6

In other election fraud news, RealClearInvestigations has a detailed expose about how Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan paid $350 million to a progressive group called the Center for Tech and Civic Life (CTCL), which, in turn, distributed those millions to cities and towns across America and worked with election officials to conduct their elections just so. We’ve previously reported on the use of this money to pay for unsupervised ballot dropboxes in locations chosen by CTCL, but this article reveals other ways in which they were involved. It’s long, but worth your time.

https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2021/05/26/how_zuckerberg_millions_paid_for_progressives_to_work_with_2020_vote_officials_nationwide_778300.html

According to the story by Stephen Miller, “In exchange for the money, elections divisions agreed to conduct their elections according to conditions set out by the CTCL, which is led by members of the New Organizing Institute, a training center for progressive groups and Democratic campaigns.”

A partner with CTCL, the Center for Civic Design, actually helped design absentee ballot forms and instructions, crafted voter registration letters for felons, and tested automatic voter registration systems. In Michigan, they worked alongside “progressive activist groups.” In Georgia (yes, Georgia) and Utah, they worked directly with elections offices.

This type of funding has apparently never been done before. Does anyone see a problem here?

It gets worse. Even Facebook got into the act, producing a webinar and guide to help election officials engage voters, specifically targeting low-income people and minorities, “helping Democratic candidates win key spots all over the U.S.”

According to court documents filed by the conservative law firm the Thomas More Society, the CTCL allowed election officials in Green Bay, Wisconsin, to use the grant money to buy vehicles to transport “voter navigators,” who were used to “assist” voters at their front doors, answering questions and witnessing ballot signatures. They also “cured” absentee ballots that lacked signatures, addresses, etc.

In Georgia, agents from CTCL trained poll workers. I can’t help wondering if they trained the small team of ballot tabulators who stayed behind in the State Farm Arena in Fulton County late on Election Night after other workers, including the poll watchers, had been dismissed over a bogus water leak. Hadn’t their “training” included the fact that they weren’t supposed to count votes without supervision?

The infuriating examples go on and on. Erick Kaardal, a lawyer with the Thomas More Society, says, “It was a pay-to-play scheme, where in exchange for taking this money, the CTCL gets to tell them how to run the election. And it’ll happen again in 2022.”

This use of private funds to control how elections are run has got to be stopped –- now. State legislatures will have to pass laws to stop it, because in the absence of such laws, some judges are enabling it to continue. For example, in Texas of all places, U.S. District Judge Amos Mazzant III, an Obama appointee, ruled in favor of this kind of funding, and apparently his stance is typical. He said, “Ultimately, plaintiffs complain that people with different political views will lawfully exercise their right to vote. That is not a harm. That is democracy.”

Wrong. The practice he ruled in favor of is HARMING DEMOCRACY.