Despite the much-publicized settlement between Fox News and Dominion Voting Systems, five “Christian influencers” still face defamation lawsuits brought against them by Eric Coomer, former director of product strategy and security for Dominion.
A recent article by Steve Rabey for MinistryWatch documents and explains Coomer’s case against the five conservative Christian personalities who he claims defamed him with their blatant lies about the 2020 presidential election.
Coomer says he was doxed, faced death threats and had to repeatedly change residences to protect his family’s safety because of these Christian antagonists.
“MinistryWatch has confirmed that Coomer’s defamation lawsuits against 15 people and entities continue, but have been slowed by pre-trial jockeying,” Rabey reported.
He quoted Steve Skarnulis, an attorney with the Colorado law firm Cain and Skarnulis who affirmed: “They’re ongoing” but declined to offer further information.
These lawsuits are distinct from Dominion’s claim against Fox News and another case still pending against Fox News by the voting machine company Smartmatic.
Among the five individuals still facing liability for lies about the election, two names are well known: Eric Metaxas and Sidney Powell.
Metaxas is a historian and seminar leader popular with conservative evangelicals. He is known for highly partisan commentary — he compared Hillary Clinton to Hitler and called her “Hitlery” — and for a biography of Dietrich Bonhoeffer discredited by academics. He is best known for promoting a false “Christian nation” origin story for the United States.
While claiming to speak truth, Metaxas admitted under oath he doesn’t verify the truth of allegations aired on his own broadcasts, Rabey reported. “Metaxas went after Dominion’s Eric Coomer on the Nov. 24, 2020, edition of the Eric Metaxas Show, carried on Salem Broadcasting. In lengthy rants, Metaxas called Coomer ‘evil’ and ‘Satanic,’ comparing him to the Unabomber.”
Specifically, Metaxas said: “There’s some people that they’re learning or rather their brains can really, they’ll flirt with insanity and violence and it sounds like you’re dealing with somebody who at least begins to fall into that category … to have a man with this kind of power, the director of strategy and security at Dominion, huge, powerful international company. This is big news.”
Rabey cites a court deposition in which Metaxas admits he did not fact check any of his claims. The self-styled historian says: “We don’t have the budget, bandwidth or time to do anything like that. I don’t see that as my job.” And he adds, “I’m not playing the role of a journalist.”
“I’m not playing the role of a journalist.”
Sidney Powell rose to national infamy as one of the chief defenders of Donald Trump’s Big Lie that the 2020 presidential election was stolen from him. In league with Rudy Giuliani, she testified on national broadcasts and anywhere she could get a hearing, presenting herself as a legal representative of Trump.
Jenna Ellis, one of the lead attorneys for Thomas More Society fighting COVID restrictions in California, also served on former President Donald Trump’s legal team. Here, she is shown in November 2020 with Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell speaking at a news conference on Trump’s behalf after he lost the election. (AP Photo/Jacquelyn Martin)
Rabey quotes Powell’s description of herself as a Christian and woman of prayer: “God hates deceit, and truth is the armor of God, so I’ve always felt like as long as I stand for truth and all I want is truth, then I’m definitely wearing the armor of God.”
Yet Powell promoted the lie that Coomer programmed Dominion machines to switch millions of votes from Trump to Biden.
And Rabey documents that like Metaxas, she now has testified under oath that she had no verification for her incendiary claims. He cites her response to an attorney’s question about how exactly Coomer influenced the outcome of the election. She responds: “I don’t have a lot of specific knowledge about what Mr. Coomer personally did.”
The other three Christian influencers still under threat of the defamation lawsuit are Joe Oltmann, founder of Colorado’s FEC United (faith, education and commerce) and leader of a rightwing militia; Michelle Malkin, a former Newsmax TV host; and Chanel Rion, former White House correspondent for One America News Network.
Oltmann called Coomer a “traitor” and said he and Dominion “rigged” elections in Mongolia and Venezuela.
Raby explains: “Oltmann has not produced evidence. He skipped out on a scheduled deposition to attend an election fraud rally organized by Michael ‘My Pillow’ Lindell, a Christian who is being sued by Dominion for $1.3 billion.”
Malkin called Coomer “an unhinged sociopath” and quoted Oltmann’s claims as evidence. Yet she admits she did not verify his claims before spreading them.
Likewise, Rion has testified she never sought to confirm her claims that Dominion machines “deleted” 2.7 million votes for Trump.
All five of these figures are alleged to have played key roles in originating and spreading lies about the 2020 presidential election — claiming to be Christians who speak truth while failing to fact check the outrageous claims they made.
Related articles:
Meet the evangelical Trump Truthers: Jenna Ellis and Eric Metaxas | Analysis by Mark Wingfield
A ‘Christian’ nation beset by false witness | Opinion by Bill Leonard
January 6 Committee hearings expose Trump for who he always has been | Opinion by Wendell Griffen