Dominion demands Sidney Powell retract 'wild, knowingly baseless and false accusations' in damning letter

Dominion Voting Systems has demanded that former Donald Trump attorney Sidney Powell – who has launched an unsuccessful, spurious legal bid to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election – retract her "wild, knowingly baseless and false accusations”about the company’s voting machines, which have been at the centre of right-wing conspiracies in the election’s aftermath.

In a letter dated 16 December, the company slammed the “coordinated media circus and fundraising scheme” helmed by Ms Powell and others that has put the company’s “employees’ lives at risk and caused enormous harm to the company.”

“Your outlandish accusations are demonstrably false,” the letter says, pointing out that Ms Powell’s allegations about the company have not been made in court, “effectively denying Dominion the opportunity to disprove” her litigation’s “false accusations.”

“While you are entitled to your own opinions, Ms Powell, you are not entitled to your own facts,” the letter says.

Among her baseless claims that have been amplified on right-wing media and across social platforms without any evidence provided in court or otherwise: Deceased Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez created Dominion machines and its software to rig its elections, Georgia officials manipulated machines, a Dominion employee is “on tape” admitting he “rigged the election” for Joe Biden, and China gave the company $200m before the election.

Dominion has “no connection to the Chinese government, the Venezuelan government, Hugo Chavez, Malloch Brown, George Soros, Bigfoot or the Loch Ness monster,” the letter says.

Dominion’s letter also asks Ms Powell to preserve documents, emails, messages, recordings and other notes related to her claims, signalling potential litigation over defamation claims.

If she refuses to tract her claims, “that will be viewed as additional evidence of actual malice,” the letter warns.

The letter follows a statement under oath from Dominion CEO John Poulos on Monday to Michigan lawmakers, warned by the company’s chief that it has been the target of a "dangerous and reckless disinformation campaign aimed at sowing doubt and confusion.”

In an emotional news conference in Georgia earlier this month, voting systems manager Gabriel Sterling, a Republican, condemned the president and his allies’ legal efforts and swirling conspiracies that provoked threats of violence against election workers and officials.

“Someone's going to get hurt, someone's going to get shot, someone's going to get killed,” he said. "This is elections. This is the backbone of democracy, and all of you who have not said a damn word are complicit in this. It’s too much.”

A Dominion employee faced death threats after conspiracy theorists falsely determined he was caught on tape manipulating voting data, and Mr Sterling and the wife of his superior, Georgia’s Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, were also threatened.

The president distanced himself from Ms Powell after she appeared alongside the president’s attorney Rudy Giuliani, who is leading the president’s litigation efforts, to broadcast conspiracies and false claims about the election and Dominion.

More than 50 lawsuits have been filed by the president’s campaign and his allies to contest election results  – nearly all of them have been withdrawn or dismissed, including twice by the US Supreme Court.