Strictly Legal | Mike Lindell’s lawyers use incompetence as a weapon

Mike Lindell, the founder and pitchman for My Pillow, is a defendant in a lawsuit in a federal court in Colorado. 

The plaintiff is Eric Coomer, the former director of product strategy and security for Dominion Voting Systems. His lawsuit is based on election fraud lies that Lindell perpetrated and amplified.

After the results of the election were called for President Joe Biden, an election denier named Joseph Oltmann co-hosted a Conservative Daily podcast on November 9, 2020. On that podcast, he claimed to have learned almost two months earlier of a conspiracy to elect Biden president of the U.S.

Oltmann claimed he gained this information after infiltrating Antifa. Oltmann began this podcast, saying: “Let’s not sugarcoat this. We’re going to expose someone inside of Dominion Voting Systems specifically related to Antifa and related to someone that is so far left and is controlling the elections, and his fingerprints are in every state. So, I want you guys to understand that what we’re about to show you, you have to share . . . The conversation will be about a man named Eric Coomer. C-O-O-M-E-R.”

Based on this “evidence,” Lindell appeared May 9, 2021 on his own streaming platform FrankSpeech and said this:

“Yeah, Eric Coomer, if I’m you right now, I am, instead of going over and making deals at Newsmax, if I’m you, I’m turning myself in and turning in the whole operation so maybe, just maybe, that you get immunity and you only get to do, I don’t know, ten, twenty years. I mean, you are disgusting, and you are treasonous. You are a traitor to the United States of America.”

Of course, prior to this appearance, Newsmax, not exactly a liberal operation, had broadcast this on May 7, 2021:

“Since election day, various guests, attorneys and hosts on Newsmax have offered opinions and claims about Dr. Eric Coomer, the Director of Product Strategy and Security at Dominion Voting Systems. Newsmax would like to clarify its coverage of Dr. Coomer and note that while Newsmax initially covered claims by President Trump’s lawyers, supporters and others that Dr. Coomer played a role in manipulating Dominion voting machines, Dominion voting software and the final vote counts in the 2020 presidential election, Newsmax subsequently found no evidence that such allegations were true. Many of the states whose results were contested by the Trump Campaign after the November 2020 election have conducted extensive recounts and audits and each of these states certified the results as legal and final.”

Coomer’s suit has been progressing since May of 2022. It’s set to go to trial on June 2. But now Lindell’s lawyers want it continued. And the basis for the continuance is, essentially, their own incompetence.

In February of this year, Coomer’s lawyers filed a motion in limine. This is standard operating procedure. The motion asks that certain evidence not be introduced in the upcoming trial. Lindell’s lawyers filed a memorandum in opposition to the motion. That memo included citations to cases that don’t actually exist. This resulted from the lawyer’s use of generative artificial intelligence in preparing the memo.

As other lawyers have discovered, AI occasionally “hallucinates” and produces fabricated content, which is ironic, given that the case is based on Lindell’s fabricated claims. In response, the court issued a show cause order demanding that Lindell’s lawyers come forward with a reason why the court should not sanction them and refer them to the Colorado Bar for discipline.

The basis for the continuance motion is that the lawyers will be too busy dealing with the show cause order to prepare for trial. I am not making that up.

This move reminds me of the film “Liar, Liar,” where Jim Carrey, who is unable to lie, objects to the introduction of a piece of evidence on the ground that “it is devastating to my case.” Well, I guess as Bob Dylan said, “When you ain’t got nothing, you got nothing to lose.”

Good luck to Lindell and his lawyers. I am pretty sure they are going to need it.

Jack Greiner is a partner at Faruki PLL law firm in Cincinnati. He represents Enquirer Media in First Amendment and media issues.