Far-right nationalist website American Thinker became the latest conservative outlet to backtrack from its baseless election fraud conspiracies about voting machines on Friday, issuing a statement retracting the “completely false” claims the site made about Dominion Voting Systems.
“These statements are completely false and have no basis in fact. Industry experts and public officials alike have confirmed that Dominion conducted itself appropriately and that there is simply no evidence to support these claims,” American Thinker editor Thomas Lifson wrote. “It was wrong for us to publish these false statements. We apologize to Dominion for all of the harm this caused them and their employees.”
Lifson ended the retraction for “misrepresenting” Dominion’s role in the election, adding: “We regret this grave error.” The statement appeared to be in response to a legal threat from Dominion’s legal team, as Lifson also wrote that they “received a lengthy letter from Dominion’s defamation lawyers explaining why they believe that their client has been the victim of defamatory statements.”
ADVERTISEMENT
In a statement Friday, Dominion said, “Platforms like American Thinker have helped amplify malicious lies about Dominion. These lies have diminished the credibility of U.S. elections, subjected officials and Dominion employees to harassment and death threats, and severely damaged the reputation of our company.” Clare Locke, the high-powered law firm representing Dominion, sent letters to Fox News, One America News and Newsmax last month informing the networks of their intention to pursue legal action over the bogus election fraud claims made about dominion on air. Lawyers for Smartmatic, another voting software company falsely accused of “stealing” the election from President Donald Trump, have issued similar letters. In response, Newsmax and Fox News ran multiple segments on-air debunking their own false claims about the company.
Dominion, meanwhile, has filed a $1.3-billion lawsuit against pro-Trump lawyer Sidney Powell over her role in peddling the outlandish conspiracy theories about corrupt voting software flipping votes from Trump to President-elect Joe Biden.
