Alan Dershowitz and other lawyers have filed a civil RICO class action case against Dominion and its PR firm, for engaging in “Lawfare” against ordinary citizens who worked as poll watchers, election personnel, etc during the 2020 election. Plaintiffs each received letters from
Dominion or its PR firm threatening billion dollar legal action, demanding retractions of unspecified defamatory statements, and demanding preservation of large sets of private records and communications. The claim is that the plaintiffs were guilty of nothing more than carrying
out their civic duty by reporting election irregularities and signing affidavits describing what they saw. Many affidavits were filed or were meant to be filed in court proceedings. Most didn’t even mention Dominion. Nevertheless Dominion allegedly engaged in a nationwide
campaign of threats and intimidation, in violation of the federal RICO statute, designed to shut down debate or even public mention of election integrity issues. The plaintiffs allege a pattern of racketeering consisting of a series of these threatening letters to persons willing
to go public with accounts of election irregularities, in violation of federal criminal obstruction and witness intimidation laws. According to the complaint, Dominion achieved some degree of success from its Lawfare campaign of threats and intimidation. Read it here:
There are also claims that Dominion has taken over the state governmental function of running elections and is therefore a state actor for purposes of a federal civil rights action under Section 1983.
Courts will be skeptical of the lawsuit’s RICO theories, but if the plaintiffs can stay in court, this case could have major implications on the increasingly popular tactic of using “Lawfare” to intimidate and to shut down dissent and debate.
The use of civil RICO is significant. Among RICO’s predicate criminal acts are the crimes of tampering with or threatening a witness. The plaintiffs, having signed an submitted affidavits to be used in court during election contests, were clearly witnesses to election
irregularities. Dominion’s threatening, baseless letters were an attempt to shut them up. Most judges do not take kindly to those types of tactics. This is a serious case.
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