Election fraud conspiracy theorist and pillow salesman Mike Lindell swore at attorneys and left the room during a series of depositions surrounding a defamation lawsuit from a former voting machines company executive who accused the MyPillow CEO of repeatedly amplifying false claims about him after the 2020 presidential election.
Newly released videos and transcripts from a series of depositions taped earlier this year reveal Mr Lindell lashing out at opposing counsel and berating attorneys for Dominion Voting Systems’ Eric Coomer as “evil” and “disgusting slime.”
At one point, Mr Lindell erupted when an attorney for Mr Coomer references a customer complaint for a MyPillow product described as “lumpy.”
“No, they’re not lumpy pillows,” Mr Lindell fumed. “When you say lumpy pillows, now you’re an a*****. You got that? You’re an a******, is what you are.”
When his attorney told him to stop, Mr Lindell called the opposing counsel an “ambulance-chasing a******”.
“That’s what you are. Lumpy pillows. Kiss my a**. Put that in your book,” Mr Lindell said.
The release of his testimony followed a motion from Mr Commer’s legal team to sanction Mr Lindell for his “vulgar, threatening, loud” and “disrespectful” remarks, and over his refusal to provide a “direct answer to virtually every question asked, instead opting to shout over Dr Coomer’s counsel and then provide lengthy, meandering filibusters that each consumed substantial amounts of time and several pages of transcript,” according to a court filing in US District Court.
The attached videos and transcripts are “demonstrably worse than any attempt to describe the conduct,” according to attorneys for Mr Coomer.
“Don’t sit and scold me already, mister. I’ll do whatever I have to do,” Mr Lindell told Mr Coomer’s attorney at the beginning of one of the depositions. “You’re an ambulance-chasing lawyer, so don’t start with me. I got all day. I’ll take as much time as you want, so let’s go. You’re not my boss. You’re just a lawyer, a frivolous lawyer. So go. Don’t start scolding me.”
Mike Lindell appears at Donald Trump’s New Jersey club in June 2023 after the former president pleaded not guilty to federal charges for mishandling classified documents.— (AP)
During an August interview, Mr Lindell appeared to get up in the middle of the deposition to call into Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast where he promoted his MyPillow products.
“I’m in the middle of a deposition for a big attack on MyPillow right now, and it’s disgusting,” he said.
His deposition “ended after Mr Lindell left the witness chair during an unscheduled break while, again, disparaging counsel,” according to attorneys for Mr Coomer, who are requesting that Mr Lindell come to Colorado for a fourth deposition.
Mr Coomer’s initial complaint accuses Mr Lindell of calling him a “traitor” as he revived a baseless conspiracy theory that Dominion manipulated votes during the 2020 election, a bogus claim central to a series of defamation cases brought against other personalities and right-wing media outlets, including Fox News.
The network reached an historic $787m settlement with Dominion earlier this year.
Dominion has also separately filed a $1.3bn defamation lawsuit against Mr Lindell over his claims.
Lindell, who has played a significant role in spurious, failed efforts to overturn Donald Trump’s election loss, unsuccessfully ran for chair of the Republican National Committee earlier this year. Last year, he was among 30 Trump allies subpoenaed by a federal grand jury investigating alleged efforts to unlawfully subvert the election.
Mr Lindell has repeatedly denied wrongdoing, labelling the lawsuits against him as a “disgrace” and “frivolous”.
