Attorney Sidney Powell, who worked with Trump allies in the aftermath of the 2020 presidential election in their frenzied effort to get the results set aside, has now filed a motion to dismiss a $1.3 billion defamation lawsuit that she is facing from Dominion Voting Systems, which was a top target of her election-related conspiracy theories. In short, Powell claimed that Dominion was entwined with an election-rigging scheme kickstarted by the late Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chávez, who died over seven years ago at this point. In response to Dominion’s defamation lawsuit, Powell claimed that “no reasonable person would conclude” that her theories were definitive “statements of fact.”
I wonder how everyone who lived and died by the words of Sidney Powell will feel knowing that her defense is to claim that NO REASONABLE PERSON WOULD CONCLUDE HER CLAIMS WERE TRULY STATEMENTS OF FACT. https://t.co/yl461IZouu
— Brian Tyler Cohen (@briantylercohen) March 22, 2021
In other words, Powell appears to be trying a “just kidding — sort of!” defense, but there’s no particular indication that her strategy is going to work. She clearly intended for her claims to be taken as definitive “statements of fact” when she spread the nonsense in the aftermath of the election. Even now, in the new court filing, Powell is sticking to her underlying idea that Dominion was involved in an election-rigging scheme, despite the fact that no meaningful evidence for this idea has ever emerged at any point! At present, she simply appears to have introduced a slim acknowledgement of potential fallibility within her election-related remarks — but the problem is that her statements were and are delusional and extremist nonsense.
JUST IN: Pro-Trump lawyer Sidney Powell has asked a DC federal judge to dismiss Dominion's $1.3 B defamation suit. Noteworthy line from the filing:
"She believed the allegations then and she believes them now."https://t.co/Gwt7aavs3c
— John Kruzel (@johnkruzel) March 22, 2021
In her filing in response to the Dominion lawsuit, Powell said that if she was wrong — which she is — then she should get protections similar to those provided to journalists who report particular disputed information from a source, but the comparison is ridiculous. Her claims about the election have never had any meaningful basis in fact whatsoever. She is a craven liar who hoped to assist in an authoritarian takeover of the United States government in the name of Donald Trump. The ex-president and his allies didn’t characterize their efforts in these terms, but that’s what would have happened if they got their wish and saw the duly documented will of the people set aside.
Powell argues she can't be liable if the information she based her "opinions and legal theories" on were actually unreliable, comparing herself to reporters who get 1A protection when they cite sources; but she later also makes clear she disputes that her info was "false" pic.twitter.com/HpVn6hh0tJ
— Zoe Tillman (@ZoeTillman) March 22, 2021
Longtime Trump ally Rudy Giuliani is facing a similar defamation lawsuit from Dominion. Like Powell, he has refused to acknowledge the utter falsity of his cuckoo claims about the 2020 presidential election. No court anywhere in the country ever even partially accepted the idea that Biden’s win was the result of fraud, but Trump allies are persisting with their nonsense anyway!
