Former Trump attorney Sidney Powell has reached a settlement with former Dominion Voting Systems executive Eric Coomer, according to court documents filed yesterday. Coomer was suing Powell as part of a larger defamation suit against Douglas County podcaster Joe Oltmann — along with his entities FEC United and Shuffling Madness Media — ultra-conservative pundit Michelle Malkin, James “Jim” Hoft of The Gateway Pundit, podcaster Eric Metaxas, One American News Network (OAN) and Chanel Rion, Sidney Powell and her organization Defending the Republic, Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani, and the Trump Campaign.
Powell, along with her law firm Sidney Powell P.C. and her “election integrity” legal advocacy nonprofit Defending the Republic, bring the number of defendants who have settled with Coomer so far in this case to six. In 2021, Newsmax settled with Coomer and issued a subsequent retraction.
“There are several facts that our viewers should be aware of. Newsmax has found no evidence that Dr. Coomer interfered with Dominion voting machines or voting software in any way, nor that Dr. Coomer ever claimed to have done so,” Newsmax’s April 2021 statement read. “Nor has Newsmax found any evidence that Dr. Coomer ever participated in any conversation with members of ‘Antifa,’ nor that he was directly involved with any partisan political organization.”
OAN and Chanel Rion settled with Coomer in September 2023.
Powell used a November 2020 affidavit from Oltmann, in which he recounted — under penalty of perjury — his contested claims that Coomer took part in an “antifa conference call,” among other demonstrably false statements, as part of her “kraken” lawsuits that aimed to prove the 2020 election was stolen.
Denver District Court Judge Marie Moses, ruling on attempts to dismiss Coomer’s defamation suit, said Oltmann’s claims were “evasive and not credible,” and concluded that Oltmann’s “statements regarding that conference call are probably false.”
In 2021, Powell and attorney Lin Wood were sanctioned $150,000 for their lawsuits filed in Michigan, which U.S. District Judge Linda Parker wrote were based on “speculation, conjecture, and unwarranted suspicion.”
Powell was represented by former state legislator Barry Arrington, a well-known figure in conservative politics. Arrington, a former Independence Institute board member, also represents Rocky Mountain Gun Owners as well as various religious right causes.
Last year, Powell pleaded guilty to reduced charges over efforts to overturn Donald Trump’s loss in the 2020 election in Georgia. Powell pleaded guilty to six misdemeanors of conspiring to intentionally interfere with the performance of election duties.
Powell’s settlement in the Coomer case comes after Oltmann fled a deposition in a related but separate defamation suit against ReAwaken America Tour founder Clay Clark. Oltmann refused to name his source for the “antifa conference call” and access to Coomer’s social media posts, both elements that were central to Oltmann’s affidavit for Powell. As a result, Oltmann is facing further sanctions and contempt of court.
Oltmann and the remaining defendants are currently appealing to the Colorado Supreme Court the recent opinion from the Colorado Court of Appeals affirming the denial of the defendants’ anti-SLAPP motions to dismiss.
