A jury is set to decide a lawsuit taken by a voting machine company against a right-wing broadcast that alleged massive fraud in the 2020 presidential election.
Steve Bannon and other hosts on Newsmax broadcast false allegations that the Smartmatic voting machine company was altering the results of the election in favor of Joe Biden. It was also alleged the company was working in connection with the Venezuelan government.
On Thursday, a Delaware judge refused to grant summary judgment to either side and set the trial for September 30.
The case is one of several lawsuits taken by voting machine companies that were allegedly libeled by Donald Trump supporters during the 2020 presidential election cycle.
Steve Bannon, former adviser to former President Donald Trump. Bannon is accused of allowing false news about the Smartmatic voting machine company to be broadcast on his Newsmax show.
Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
Smartmatic, which is registered in Delaware and operates from Boca Raton, Florida, is suing Newsmax, alleging that its false claims damaged the company’s reputation.
Newsmax said it was using its first amendment free speech rights to report the allegations.
Judge Eric Davis noted in Thursday’s ruling that Smartmatic technology was only used in Los Angeles and that Newsmax had made false statements about the company.
“Statements regarding Smartmatic software or voting machines altering the results of the election are factually false,” he wrote.
However, he said that statements broadcast on Newsmax about Smartmatic’s alleged ties to the Venezuelan government have not yet been shown to be false.
“Therefore, the court will allow Newsmax to contest falsity as to Smartmatic’s connections with Venezuela,” he wrote.
Newsweek sought email comment from Smartmatic and Newsmax on Friday.
In a previous court decision in February, 2023, in which Davis denied summary judgment to Newsmax, he noted that “in 2004, Smartmatic’s technology was used in the first automated election in Venezuela. The technology provided both an electronic and paper trail for each vote, which allowed election officials to cross-check and audit the vote count to ensure accurate results.”
He also noted that Newsmax discussed the 2004 Venezuelan election often because Smartmatic contracted with what the station called the ‘Hugo Chavez-led Venezuelan government.'”
He also noted that Newsmax had benefited from sharing allegations about Smartmatic.
“From July 2020 to the week before the Election, Newsmax ‘averaged 58,000 viewers from 7 to 10 p.m. on weekdays.’ At that time, Fox News‘ viewership numbers far exceeded Newsmax’s viewership. One week after the Election, Newsmax’s ratings jumped tenfold from its preelection numbers. After the Election, then-President Trump tweeted Newsmax clips to his Twitter followers, which Newsmax highlighted to its viewers. In the three days following the Election, Newsmax’s viewership surpassed Fox Business and CNBC. These coverage increases led to more viewers and more money for Newsmax,” he wrote.
“Newsmax’s daytime viewership also increased by a multiple of ten, and the number of daily active users on its mobile app increased fourteen-fold from pre- to postelection.”
“Shortly after the Election, Rudolph Giuliani and [Trump attorney] Sidney Powell disseminated a false narrative that the election was rigged for President Biden through manipulation of election technology. Mr. Giuliani and Ms. Powell started to appear regularly on Fox News around November 12, 2020, and casted Smartmatic and Dominion Voting Systems as the wrongdoers.”
“On November 14, 2020, Steve Bannon, then-President Trump’s former Chief Strategist, appeared on his Newsmax podcast, War Room. Mr. Bannon’s guest, Brian Kennedy, identified by Newsmax as the ‘Chairman of the Committee on the Present Danger,’ stated that Smartmatic made voting machines that scanned election ballots and alleged that Smartmatic’s CEO was a “Venezuelan national, and a leftist and somebody who … built these machines using Chinese components that themselves could be hacked into.’ Mr. Kennedy claimed there was ‘industrial level ballot manipulation,’ and that this was ‘election fraud, not voter fraud.’
Davis noted that on November 16, 2020, six Newsmax programs aired allegedly false statements about Smartmatic and that Newsmax used Fox News’ interviews with Rudolph Giuliani and Sidney Powell on Sunday Morning Futures with Maria Bartiromo.
In the clip, “Mr. Giuliani stated this occurred at least in Michigan,” even though the Smartmatic machinery was only used in Los Angeles.
