Victim Impact Statement Template: Fill & Download for Free

*Consider, as I often mention, the PCL is not meant to actually identify psychopaths (depending upon how psychopathy is defined)… it is a risk-assessment tool used to estimate risk of violent recidivism as a function of a given level of “psychopathy” as derived through the items evaluated. I tend to call this “forensic” psychopathy. It is not necessarily the same thing as neurobiological “real” psychopathy, as it focuses far more on overt (particularly criminal) behaviour than it does upon neurological functioning/structures.—————————————————————————————————————Purely for shits n’ giggles. I’ve followed the template that I used on this question:Alex Umbreanu's answer to How accurately does the character Cathy Ames from "East of Eden" match a psychopathic phenotype?I have no idea what the heck I am doing. I’ve never been trained in this. Had a psychologist tell me that half points can be “awarded”, but now not so sure… seems to be that the scores are initially presented decimals (to one point?) and then rounded up at the end. As I am not comparing it to any known norms… this is neither PCL-R or -R2.I might not explain everything as clearly as I otherwise would… as I don’t want to disclose any identifying information.This shows some of the diagnonsense that has already been written about me, including my results from a forensic administration of the PCL-R2 (briefly, I scored 25/40, with 98.9th percentile factor 1 and 51st percentile factor 2. I don’t know which items received which scores though.). I will try to guess how they scored me, but also score myself… both conservatively and with broader definitions (see the Cathy Ames report).This is purely speculative and is not at all meant to be used in any court setting or as “evidence” against me in any way. It could purely be the result of my apparent “lack of insight”. It is not meant to somehow “glorify” anything… as if any of the following represents a “glowing review”. -_- Mentions of past misdeeds are as meagre as I can make them, as I don’t want to be sensationalistic… only to present bare facts. Please do not see this as somehow “inspirational” or otherwise “enviable”; it is not. Much of what is detailed here, regarding specific behaviour relates to events and patterns that are several years past, and which I do not engage in anymore (specific crimes) and/or try to avoid (interpersonal shittiness).A good deal of this is historical, please don’t assume that I am speaking of myself as I am now.—————————————————————————————————————FULL untrained PCL on Yours Truly (AKA Alex Umbreanu, Alex Legere, et al.)F1.1:1/Glibness and/or Superficial Charm: Consistently described as “verbally facile”, “articulate”, “having a way with words”, “engaging” etc. by clinicians (et al.). Very disarming in person, esp. when compared with apparent presentation found in existing reports. Likeable/personable on a superficial/acquaintance/temporary basis (e. g. for manipulation, or anything else really). Described as “magnetic”; attracted “friends” and followers throughout life easily, but seldom able to maintain the relationships long-term. Very good first impressions (e. g. has been hired “on the spot” as a result of them). Have been able to talk my way out of trouble, and to talk others into it (e. g. has historically manipulated others into engaging in serious criminal activity). Puts people at ease and gains confidences quickly (e. g. others confide and share secrets, feel comfortable and safe etc.). Concealed crimes with this demeanor. Friendly, outgoing, bold, pleasant, polite, entertaining, etc. 2/2F1.1:2/Grandiose Sense of Self-Worth: Narcissistic PD (and related Personality Disorder NOS) diagnosis, DSM IV-TR version, not DSM V. Arrogant. Entitled in attitude, demeanor, behaviour, and statements. Self-concerned, self-assured, self-centred etc. Opinionated, condescending. Very high opinion of self and entitlement often concealed with passive aggressive statements and superficial presentation (i. e. superficially may appear to have low self-appraisal). Historically saw self as “predator”, superior for being a “psychopath”, bragged about it, etc. Aura of superiority; expectation of preferential and deferential treatment. [Mind you, I can moderate this stuff, lol] 2/2F2.3:3/Need for Stimulation/Proneness to Boredom: Many crimes and breaches a result (at least, in part) of boredom, curiosity, and plain intolerance of status quo. Took stupid risks, overall. Lack of caution regarding personal safety and freedom. Unable to tolerate boredom throughout school (particularly elementary): ignored instruction, did own thing, got into trouble at times (some of this all likely related to high IQ, not just potential “psychopathy”). Lack of concern regarding consequences: learning from mistakes, “fear” conditioning etc. Subjective “fearlessness”. Skewed reaction to danger and threats when compared with “neurotypical”, physiologically. Autonomic (sympathetic) under-arousal overall. Jail etc. not truly a “punishment”, instead, regarded as a “new experience” or an “experiment”. Hesitant to commit to the full 2/2 because I am not a restless “adrenaline junkie”/”daredevil”/thrill-seeker. 1.5 to 2/2F1.1:4/Pathological Lying: Obfuscation. Described as “sneaky” and “cunning”. Concealed crimes for years with no internal dissonance, concern, or any external indication. Complex web of aliases, backstories, lies etc. “Catfish” online, historically. Misrepresented self/actions/etc. through minimizing/exaggerating (fabrication/denial) to craft a given image/persona (which was shallow and instrumental). Full of explanations and excuses. Contradicts self relatively often. No loyalty to the “truth” when self-interest is at stake. Insincere. Hesitant to commit to the full 2/2 because I am not a “pathological” or “compulsive” liar. 1.5 to 2/2.F1.1:5/Conning/Manipulative: Manipulated others into committing/abetting/ignoring serious and/or violent crimes( and concealing such), and/or taking blame for them (e. g. historical [i. e. not current!] attempted murders, fires, torture/killing of non-human animals, stealing, etc.). Described by clinicians (et al.) as “very astute” at manipulating the behaviours and perceptions of others (who would “quickly feel that I was their friend”). Schemer; thinks several steps ahead (when not being impulsive… lol). Highly developed cognitive empathy. Absolutely zero concern for victims. Historically, had made people quit jobs and/or abandon responsibilities through manipulation (including use of “abilities” in item 1, gaslighting, solipsistic arguments etc.). I have chosen 2/2, but I considered 1.5/2 because I have never tried to “con” anyone for any financial etc. reason. I have no interest in doing so. 2/2F1.2:6/Lack of Remorse/Guilt: Complete lack of remorse throughout life. No concern for victims or impact on victims. Considered potential for danger as a bit of a “joke”. Doesn’t take self or crimes seriously. Shameless. Absence of sincere social emotionality in general. Will blame victims and situations etc. Past failures to change despite “remorse”. Lack of moral inhibition (i. e. vulgar definition of “conscience”). 2/2F1.2:7/Shallow Affect: Two “flavours”: (1) Hypercompartmentalization ability (e. g. “empathy switch”). Everything “felt” thus is, by definition, shallow. Can turn it off whenever, and turn it on… to a degree. (2) Low affective empathy and low autonomic (sympathetic) arousal. Taught to “over-emote” as a way to compensate, during early elementary school years by counselor. Otherwise, can appear “cold “(as opposed to “dramatic”). Limited emotionality (particularly “social” emotions) and emotional contagion. Subjective “fearlessness”, also noticeably calm under pressure/stress/etc. compared to “neurotypical” (neurological root). Shallow, superficially felt emotions, when not able to enter a hypercompartmentalized state. 2/2F1.2:8/Callousness/Lack of (Affective) Empathy: Sadist (various diagnoses thereof, including erotophonophilic sadism, sexual sadism etc.). Profound lack of affective empathy. Superficially “aided” in investigations into own crimes. Very self-concerned/centered and selfish. Deeply callous regarding the pain and distress of others throughout life, and has (at times) purposefully exacerbated it via instrumental manipulative tactics or overt actions of varying severity. All about own interests, curiosity, entertainment, power, thrill etc. Cynical (for some reason that was listed on the cheat sheet as being relevant?). Historically exploits friends, family, employer etc. 2/2F2.3:9/Parasitic Lifestyle: Lazy and unambitious. Will always “let” others “do”, as opposed to spending own resources/effort. No drive to actively provide for self or to “stand on own two feet”. Ambivalent. Currently on government benefits (although, I do have a job now too), and that was my main source of income for almost 10 years now (not entirely my fault though). Hesitant to go over 1 because I am not opposed to working or providing for myself, and I have never had any problems doing so otherwise. I have never been an itinerant “mooch”, and nor have I ever criminally exploited others for financial gain. 0.5 to 1/2.F2.4:10/Poor Behavioural Control: No temper/has never lost temper (not counting as a toddler… I assume I must have back then?). Actually used to complain that I had “too much self control” (apparently selective self control, lol). Defensive, and can become irritable and reactive (possibly more of a current context [past… nearly 10 years] thing though, than a deeper trait). Will over-emote (habit, occasionally manipulative though). Historical: 0 to 0.5/2. Current context?: 0.5 to 1/2.F0:11/Promiscuous Sexual Behavour: Narrow: Never dated, never had sex. Likely more the result of gender identity issues, as opposed to anything else. Broad (“Impersonal Sexual Behaviour”): When disconnected from physical body (e. g. online), historically was promiscuous. Very perverse. Shameless. Impersonal/casual/manipulative “sexuality”. No loyalty or commitment. Can’t justify scoring over 1.5 (even that might be too high), without physical involvement. Narrow: 0/2. Broad: 1 to 1.5/2.F2.4:12/Early Behavioural Problems: Severe (e. g. torture/killing non-human animals since early childhood [i. e. 5 and under]). ADD/ADHD “diagnosis” at 7… validity uncertain. However, consistently described as “hyperactive”, “disinhibited”, and “fearless” as a kid. Suspended from school for setting fires. Conduct disorder diagnosis in teens (DSM IV-TR). Stealing, lying. Serious violent offences against people beginning at age 12 (only ever prosecuted once). Attempts to “poison” family several times, beginning under age 5 (roughly 5–9?). Problems at school noted as early as grade 1; for 3 years received intervention regarding empathy, socializing properly, “fitting in” etc. Other psych interventions in childhood/youth for similar reasons. 2/2.F2.3:13/Lack of Realistic Long-Term Goals: Relatively poor goal setting and self-discipline (or, certainly, very selective). Lack of direction and motivation (could be a current circumstances thing?). Starts “projects” and seldom finishes them. Commitment issues regarding goals and deadlines. “Done little in life” (was on cheat sheet?… in my opinion, others might say I’ve done a lot though). Scrambling for direction, hard to settle. Can be indecisive (again, these are probably more resultant from “current” stuff). Historically set goals that took many years to complete, no problem. Historical: 0.5 to 1/2. Current: 1–1.5/2.F2.3:14/Impulsivity: Some of the crimes, particularly those that I’ve been charged/convicted for, were impulsive. Can be randomly impulsive at times, including for serious things. 1/2.F2.3:15/Irresponsibility: No loyalty (e. g. has exploited/stolen from family, friends, employers etc. This was on the “cheat sheet”.). Word not necessarily bond. Not responsible with own or others safety. Hesitant to go over 1 because I otherwise am punctual, pay bills, care for myself etc. 0.5 to 1/2.F1.2:16/Failure to Accept Responsibility: Constant excuses, rationalizations, blame, minimize, defensiveness etc. Cognitively appreciates “responsibility” (i. e. it’s not like I don’t understand cause and effect). Maybe better phrased as: “Failure to accept responsibility and consequences”. Feels it is unfair, complains, fights it etc. 2/2.F0:17/Many Short-Term Marital Relationships: Narrow: Never been married. Broad (“Relational Instability”): Family estrangement. No long-term friends (can maintain a couple of years, at most). Only very shallow relationships (in person). “Deeper” relationships (e. g. those which are “more involved”, in person) marked by conflict. Exploitative and selfish in relationships. Shallow friendships. Quick “in and out” with people. Transactional. Makes friends easily, but can’t/won’t maintain before getting bored of them, driving them away, or dropping off myself. Narrow: 0/2. Broad: 2/2.F2.4:18/Juvenile Delinquency: Arrest in mid-teens for serious violent offence (counting only formal contacts, not everything you’ve done). 2/2.F2.4:19/Revocation of Conditional Release: Narrow: Various breach charges. Broad (“Institutional Maladjustment”): Breaches, as above. Serious violent offence while already institutionalized. Engaged in serious crimes while on probation as a youth. Can’t go over 1.5 because no serious arrest while on conditional release, nor any “escape” attempts. Narrow: 1/2. Broad: 1.5/2.F2.4:20/Criminal Versatility: Charges and convictions only (variety, not severity) Violent crimes against both humans and non-human animals. Weapons/threats. Breaches. Can’t go over 1, “cheat sheet” says 4–5 results in 1/2. 6 or more types gives 2/2. 1/2. Well… could be 2/2 then. So. 1 to 2/2.…Most narrow definitions:Considering current circumstances (i. e. past +/- 10 years)Factor 1: 1. Interpersonal 7.5 to 8/8 | 2. Affective 8/8 | Total:15.5 to 16/16Factor 2: 3. Lifestyle 4.5 to 6.5/10 | 4. Antisocial Conduct 6.5 to 8/10 | Total: 11 to 14.5/20Other: 0/4Total: 26.5 to 30.5/40…Historical (not including possible behavioural alterations resultant from circumstances of past +/- 10 years)Factor 1: 1. Interpersonal 7.5 to 8/8 | 2. Affective 8/8 | Total:15.5 to 16/16Factor 2: 3. Lifestyle 4 to 6/10| 4. Antisocial Conduct 6 to 7.5/10 | Total: 10 to 13.5/20Other: 0/4Total: 25.5 to 29.5(concerning the results from my early 20s: the scoring could have looked similar to the way that the minimum of this did)————————————————————————————————————Less conservative (using the broad definition of item 19):Considering current circumstances (i. e. past +/- 10 years)Factor 1: 1. Interpersonal 7.5 to 8/8 | 2. Affective 8/8 | Total: 15.5 to 16/16Factor 2: 3. Lifestyle 4.5 to 6.5/10 | 4. Antisocial Conduct 7 to 8.5/10 | Total: 11.5 to 15/20Other: 0/4Total: 27 to 31/40…Historical (not including possible behavioural alterations resultant from circumstances of past +/- 10 years)Factor 1: 1. Interpersonal 7.5 to 8/8 | 2. Affective 8/8 | Total:15.5 to 16/16Factor 2: 3. Lifestyle 4 to 6/10 | 4. Antisocial Conduct 6.5 to 8/10 | Total: 10.5 to 14/20Other: 0/4Total: 26 to 30/40————————————————————————————————————Least conservative (using the broad definitions of item 19 and the two items composing the unclassified factor):Considering current circumstances (i. e. past +/- 10 years)Factor 1: 1. Interpersonal 7.5 to 8/8 | 2. Affective 8/8 | Total: 15.5 to 16/16Factor 2: 3. Lifestyle 4.5 to 6.5/10 | 4. Antisocial Conduct 7 to 8.5/10 | Total: 11.5 to 15/20Other: 3 to 3.5/4Total: 30 to 34.5/40…Historical (not including possible behavioural alterations resultant from circumstances of past +/- 10 years)Factor 1: 1. Interpersonal 7.5 to 8/8 | 2. Affective 8/8 | Total:15.5 to 16/16Factor 2: 3. Lifestyle 4 to 6/10 | 4. Antisocial Conduct 6.5 to 8/10 | Total: 10.5 to 14/20Other: 3 to 3.5/4Total: 29 to 33.5—————————————————————————————————————Phew…Overall range: 25.5 to 34.5/40.Averaged score: 30/40.Fair enough.

To answer this question, I think it is important to first answer:What is the purpose of a definition?What makes a definition useful?What are the goals and values that underly our definition?My own answer to the above questions is as follows:The purpose of a definition in general is to:Facilitate communication between peopleAccurately and completely describe the worldIncrease understanding between peopleIn this case, specifically, to be useful a definition needs to:Have the effect of reducing bigotryHelp those whose goal is to foster tolerance, equality, inclusion, etc.If we have different goals/beliefs about these meta points, then it is reasonable that we might come to different conclusions and opinions about the definition. Assuming, for a moment, though that you agree with this premise that these are the important elements of a good definition, I will explain my own interpretation of how this definition that you posit holds up against these goals.That being said, before evaluating how this definition stacks up with respect to these goals, I’d first like to explain how I personally define the term, which will be helpful to understanding what I mean when I, myself, use the term.My definition of racismTo me, the different -isms, -phobias, etc. are special cases of a more general phenomenon that is described by such terms as “bigotry”, “prejudice”, “bias”, etc.Although each of the different -isms, -phobias, etc. (e.g. racism, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, homophobia, sexism, misogyny, etc.) have different histories and manifestations, they are all fundamentally different forms of bigotry, prejudice, bias, intolerance, etc. with the main distinction between terms being the category of identity (and possibly the value in that category) on which it was based.In other words, each of these different words can share a definition template:___<WORD>__ is bigotry/prejudice on the basis of (perceived) ___<IDENTITY>__For example:Anti-Semitism is bigotry/prejudice on the basis of (perceived) Jewish identityAnd, similarly:Sexism is bigotry/prejudice on the basis of (perceived) sexMisogyny is bigotry/prejudice on the basis of (perceived) female identityRacism is bigotry/prejudice on the basis of (perceived) raceAnti-Blackness is bigotry/prejudice on the basis of (perceived) Black-nessI take it for granted that the definition that I supplied is the “standard”, “classic”, or “historical” definitions of these terms (I will use that phrasing in the remainder of my answer to contrast with the “proposed” definition).Evaluating the proposed alternative definitionWith the above in mind, let’s consider the definition “oppression practiced in social or political institutions” as a substitution for the classic definition above.1. Facilitating communicationThe phenomenon described by this definition is certainly one way that inequality, discrimination, bigotry, and racism manifest and so it is useful for there to be some word or phrase that reflects this idea/phenomenon. But should that word/phrase be racism, replacing existing definitions of the term? I would argue that redefining a term with a well understood meaning is detrimental to effective communication.There are alternative phrases such as “systemic racism”, “systemic oppression”, “systems of oppression”, “institutional racism”, etc. that clearly describe the phenomenon without changing the meaning of the existing word. I would argue that changing the meaning of the existing term merely creates confusion that makes it more difficult to discuss the issue in general.2. Accurately and completely describing the worldAlthough institutions of oppression is certainly one way that racism manifests, redefining the term in this way erases other forms of bigotry/prejudice that are still enormously significant. According to the FBI national hate crime statistics in 2018, there were 4,047 race-based hate crimes (of which 1,943 were anti-Black and 485 were anti-Latinx) resulting in the victimization of 5,155 people (of which 2,426 were Black and 671 were Latinx), and these stats are likely an undercounting (both because of systemic police racism leading to reduced reporting in the African American community and because participation in the FBI hate stats collection is presently voluntary for state and local law enforcement agencies, with many such agencies not reporting any numbers). These are huge, huge, huge numbers. Of all the FBI hate crime statistics, the “race/ethnicity/ancestry” category makes up the bulk of hate crimes in the country. Redefining the term erases these.It’s also important to think through the logical, future implications of the term; for example, if we ever (hopefully) get to a future in which there are finally reparations for the enslavement of Black people, in which white nationalists and white supremacists are no longer a part of the government, in which hate groups are politically disempowered, etc., do those advocating for the new definition intend to say that it is “not racist” for a member of these disempowered hate groups to assault someone solely because of that person’s racial identity? It seems like that absurd result would be the logical implication of such a redefinition.Although, overall, I think that this proposed definition is not beneficial or correct, there are — at the very least — some valid, legitimate ideas underlying it. In particular, it is really important nuance to consider whether negative statements about/towards a given group are based in bigotry/prejudice vs a reaction to bigotry/prejudice; for example, it is not always the case that statements are equal in their impact/harm or prejudicial motive when substituting one racial group for another; some “anti-white” statements by Black people are not really anti-white (as in, not against people for being white), but really against the experiences of racism, discrimination, etc. experienced as a result of the dominant white culture. However, I think that this important nuance can be captured with the classic definition and does not require this new definition to explain.3. Increase understanding between peopleThere is already far too much confusion regarding what bigotry (including racism) is and how it functions. People are already confused regarding how to consider and weight intent and effect — people incorrectly assume that a person cannot perform a racist act or make a racist statement without a deliberately bigoted intent (a non-racist act/statement can be transformed into a racist one with such a malicious intent, but a facially racist act/statement is racist regardless of the intentions behind it, with it being possible to act in a bigoted manner unintentionally). This definition simply adds to this confusion in ways that are counter-productive to moving the conversation forward on this issue.4. Have the effect of reducing bigotryTo the contrary, this definition has the opposite effect.For example, the definition gives too much emphasis to political power. This emphasis on political power results in bigotry between different people with different marginalized identities having their bigotry erased or obscured. It is also highly subject to bigoted presumptions of who holds power; for example, in connection with anti-Semitic tropes about outsized Jewish power, Jews are often presumed to be politically powerful in ways that then erase racism when it is directed against Jews. Likewise, it becomes fairly troublesome when it comes to individuals who come from marginalized identity groups but have political power.On top of this, it is unhelpful by breaking the symmetry between the different kinds of -isms, -phobias, etc. By using a common definition for each of these special cases of bigotry, the classic definition makes it possible to highlight the commonalities in bigotry/prejudice directed against many different groups. This highlighting of commonality, in turn, helps to create unity between different groups in the cause of opposing bigotry. Likewise, it even helps to gain support among the dominant social groups; for example, while anti-Blackness (like misogyny) assumes a specific value of the identity category, the term racism (like sexism) does not presume a directionality or specific value of the identity category — it merely assumes the type of identity that it operates on. While there are far more hate crimes directed from dominant values compared to non-dominant ones, hate crimes from non-dominant values towards dominant values are not zero (e.g. in 2018, the FBI recorded 762 anti-white hate crimes resulting in 1,038 victims). By defining bigotry/prejudice in this general way, it is helpful in causing those with dominant identities to recognize that they, too, benefit from laws against hate crimes and that work to reduce bigotry can protect them and help them, too. Emphasizing this point (though understandably frustrating to those who are most often targeted by such hate crimes) is actually really important in terms of effectively advocating against bigotry and creating change, especially since it is members of the dominant group that predominantly engage in the problematic behaviors and also have the political power to make change happen; thus, persuading them is critical, which is done by emphasizing shared benefit.5. Help those whose goal is to foster tolerance, equality, inclusion, etc.The proposed definition is helpful to inverting hierarchies of oppression rather than dismantling them; it is helpful to creating oppression olympics; it is helpful to supporting an identarian far-left that ironically, despite its intentions in countering identarianism on the far-right, serves to reinforce the identarian far-right.It is not effective or helpful in fostering tolerance, equality, inclusion, etc.While it is very much legitimate (and important) to highlight systems of oppression and how these can be an often invisible and ignored facet of how anti-Blackness functions, this can be done more adeptly without this redefinition.ConclusionIn my opinion, I think that this definition creates more harm than good. That being said, while I have strong opinions on this topic, it is really important to emphasize that, just because someone subscribes to the proposed definition, this does not mean that their usage is wrong or malicious; they may simply have a different set of experiences or a different set of thought processes than I do on this topic.See alsoOn the need for an objective framework for understanding bigotryProgressives have a new definition of racism: 'prejudice plus power.' What does that mean for Jews? - Jewish Telegraphic AgencyRacism Does Not Equal Prejudice + Power - AreoThe Two Confusing Definitions of RacismPrejudice plus powerWho Can Be ‘Racist’? | Opinion | The Harvard CrimsonThe Many Shades of BigotrySystematic Inequality - Center for American ProgressThe Forward Stumbles Into the Definition of Anti-SemitismWhite Jews: An Intersectional Approach | AJS Review | Cambridge CoreDynamics of BigotryRelated answersMy answer to How do you define these terms: anti-Semitism, racism, sexism, homophobia, etc.?My answer to How is anti semitism defined?My answer to Can Jewish people be racist towards Indian or Chinese people?My answer to How can Arabs be antisemitic when they are Semites?My answer to Do you think African Americans will ever get reparations?My answer to What would you say to someone who argues that Blacks should have overcome slavery and racism in America because so many Jewish Americans have been successful after the Holocaust?My answer to How do I respond to a friend who says they can relate to the oppression of black Americans because of their Jewish ancestry?My answer to Some say the Jews had it worse than anyone else (not downplaying the suffering of the Jews). Can the Holocaust be compared to the slave trade?My answer to Is it possible for black people to be anti-Semitic given that Africans were the original Jews?My answer to Is discrimination necessarily racism?My answer to Why do white supremacists hate white Jews?My answer to What is the relation between anti-Semitism and white supremacy?My answer to Why do some Afro-Americans hate Jews?My answer to Despite Jewish people in America not being targeted nearly as much as African Americans or other marginalized people, why is Antisemitism treated far worse than other types of bigotry?My answer to Why are people so opposed to racism, but are often fine with antisemitism?My answer to A racist against Jews is called an anti-semite, do other races have specific names for their racists?My answer to If Jordan Peterson opposes identity politics, why does he support Zionism?

I am so GODDAM FUCKING SICK AND TIRED OF THIS SHIT that I just spent $72 in order to post an excellent article from Fortune Magazine that cites dates and people and FACTS about this destructive LIE regarding the 2020 election. Here’s my copying of it - I’m not going to prettify it because I’M TIRED OF THIS BULLSHIT THAT’S DESTROYING OUR DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC.JUST FUCKING READ ———————————On Dec. 9, Nicole Nollette, an executive at Dominion Voting Systems, was driving home from a doctor’s appointment when she noticed she’d missed a call from one of her customers.The client, an elections official whose jurisdiction uses Dominion’s voting machines, had also sent her a link to a website. Nollette pulled up the site on her phone and saw her own photo—overlaid with bright red crosshairs, as though she were in the sights of a sniper’s rifle. The website, which bore the moniker “Enemies of the People,” also included an address in Nevada, showing aerial views of that property beneath Nollette’s picture. That alarmed Nollette even more, because she doesn’t live in Nevada but in Colorado, where Dominion is based. The address was for the home of her retired parents. Months later, the Navy veteran remembers the fear in her mother’s voice over the phone as her parents loaded the website: “They have a picture of the house,” her mom gasped.Nollette was one of more than a dozen people, ranging from other Dominion employees to Trump administration officials, whose photos were posted on the website. The site accused them all of playing a role in an elaborate conspiracy to rig November’s presidential election by “flipping” votes for Donald Trump to Joe Biden—and relying on Dominion’s machines, which are in use in 28 states, to do it. Later that day, the FBI showed up on Nollette’s parents’ doorstep to alert them to the menace. Soon, Nollette herself received death threats—including one sent to her personal email address, warning, “Your days are numbered.” She still doesn’t know who sent them, though the FBI later notified Dominion and others that its intel had linked the hit list to Iran.The threats have tapered in the months since President Trump left the White House. But Nollette, who lives alone, still watches for suspicious cars around her street. And while she once made a daily habit of taking walks before sunrise and after sunset, she now goes out only in the light of day. “This is the first time since I left the military that, at least in terms of security and threats, I’ve had to engage that military training,” she says.Nollette’s life is one of many upended by perhaps the mother of all conspiracy theories: a far-fetched but pernicious tale spun up in a last-ditch attempt to overturn the outcome of the presidential election. It’s a tale that found its roots in a rat’s nest of misinformation and which has come to be known, among many who have encountered it, as the Big Lie. Judges, election officials, cybersecurity experts, and governors have been publicly badgered for discrediting it, or vilified for failing to prove it. Others have faced Nollette’s fate, or harassment still more severe. Eric Coomer, Dominion’s director of product strategy and security, was doxed by one of the theory’s espousers about a week after the election. A mountain climber and bread-baker with a Ph.D. in nuclear physics, Coomer has not been able to return home since the threats began and is hiding somewhere outside the U.S.; even his lawyer doesn’t know where he is.The Dominion narrative drew oxygen from various corners of the Internet and conservative political spheres. Trump himself tweeted on Nov. 12 that Dominion “deleted” 2.7 million of his votes. But it passed a point of no return on Nov. 19. That’s when Rudy Giuliani, the former New York mayor, and Sidney Powell, an appellate lawyer and a onetime federal prosecutor, both then representing the Trump campaign, held a press conference at the Republican National Committee headquarters in Washington to focus on “legal challenges” to the election results.Up until that day, Dominion might have been able to mount a defense with a fact-checking campaign aimed at correcting the record; it had hired crisis PR specialists as well as a top physical- and cyber-security firm. “It never really dawned on me that these people had ruined our company,” says John Poulos, Dominion’s cofounder and CEO. But he felt his world tilt as he watched the press conference unfold.LONG-HAUL LITIGANT John Poulos, photographed in Atlanta in March 2021.Photograph by Chuck MarcusSome 25 minutes into the event, Giuliani mentioned Dominion for the first time—just around the memorable moment that his hair dye began streaming down his face. He later singled out Coomer by name, calling him a “vicious, vicious man” who was “close to Antifa.” Giuliani and Powell went on to allege that Dominion’s software had been built in Venezuela under orders of dictator Hugo Chávez for the purpose of fixing elections, and that it counted votes in Germany and Spain—claims that were easily disproved, but were red meat to partisans convinced that the GOP had been victimized.“It was just a surreal moment,” says Poulos, who was at home in Toronto with his wife, three teenagers, and two dogs. “I thought that they were working to incite a civil war.”Earlier that month, Powell had promised to release the “Kraken,” a monster of Norse lore that was her metaphor for evidence of widespread voter fraud. That evidence, according to authorities ranging from the Department of Justice to Republican election attorneys, has yet to be delivered. What Powell and Giuliani unleashed instead was a barrage of misinformation that embedded shrapnel-like shards of doubt in the walls of democracy. In the days after the press conference, Giuliani and Powell would repeat their claims about Dominion many more times on right-leaning cable networks, including the most popular of all, Fox News, which last year commanded more than 3.5 million nightly prime-time viewers. Other sources far less reputable or official picked up the story and ran with it: According to Zignal Labs, which tracks opinion trends across media, Dominion has been mentioned in reference to rigging the election more than 400,000 times on Twitter, YouTube, and other social media. Dominion for countless Trump supporters quickly became a name synonymous with suspicion and scandal.We are not initiating claims to reach a settlement agreement where the truth can't come out.John Poulos, CEO, Dominion Voting SystemsThe Dominion narrative became one of the thickest clouds in a fog of calumny around the election. In the two weeks after the Associated Press called the race for Biden, Fox News either questioned or put forth conspiracy theories about the results at least 774 times, according to Media Matters, a nonprofit that tracks right-leaning misinformation. A survey around the same time by researchers from universities including Northeastern found that more than half of Republican voters either thought Trump had won or weren’t sure who did. Poulos’s own uncle, in Arizona, believes Dominion played some role in a conspiracy. “He doesn’t know what parts to disbelieve,” Poulos says.The consequences played out in unspeakably tragic form on Jan. 6, when a mob, made up predominantly of those who believed the election was stolen, broke into the U.S. Capitol in a riot that left five people dead.Two days later, Dominion filed its first defamation lawsuit. Poulos had decided to litigate not long after the November press conference. “The only remedy that we have is by taking their case to court,” he says. “The truth absolutely needs to come out.”Accidental plaintiffsIn the chaos of the nation’s corrosive election dispute, it was easy to miss the significance of the attacks on Dominion. When Trump backers spread general (if largely baseless) rumors about wide-scale ballot and voter fraud, their allegations were easily defensible as free political speech. But when Powell and Giuliani pointed the finger at Dominion, they crossed a crucial line. Now the operatives were making specific claims about a specific party, in ways that were economically damaging. And because those claims were quickly discredited—including in investigations by GOP election operatives who had every motive to hope they were true—the speakers’ insistence on repeating them would seem, legally, to demonstrate “actual malice,” or reckless disregard for the truth.“If they meet all of those elements, then you can hold people accountable, regardless of the fact that it is in the context of the political process,” says attorney Tom Clare. Clare has not lost a defamation trial since founding his libel-focused law firm, Clare Locke, seven years ago; now he’s representing Dominion.On Jan. 8, Dominion filed a defamation case against Powell. Over the next few weeks it filed similar suits against Giuliani and Mike Lindell, the CEO of MyPillow, who has released hours-long videos rife with conspiracy theories starring Dominion; each suit requests damages of $1.3 billion. The company filed its fourth suit on March 26 against Fox News, asking for a judgment of more than $1.6 billion. (Dominion’s is the second big defamation case Fox is facing based on its coverage of voting machines: In February, Smartmatic—a competitor to Dominion with considerably smaller U.S. operations—sued Fox for $2.7 billion.) It’s a history-making tornado of litigation, legal experts say, for the volume of claims against multiple defendants around the same issue. “That is, in my experience, unique,” says J. Erik Connolly, Smartmatic’s attorney, who successfully sued ABC News for its “pink slime” coverage on behalf of a beef company in the biggest defamation suit on record. “From a reputational damage perspective, it’s a perfect storm.”$1.6 billionDamages sought by Dominion Voting Systems in its defamation suit against Fox NewsThe cases are also potentially groundbreaking in a more significant way, one whose ramifications are impossible to predict: They’re an effort by private companies to make other parties literally pay for abusing political discourse—including a media giant that has had a huge influence on 21st-century public life. Fox argues that the voting-machine allegations were inherently newsworthy, and that the airtime it gave them is protected under the First Amendment’s guarantee of freedom of the press. The plaintiffs argue that the falsity of the allegations, and the apparent endorsement of them by some Fox hosts, strips those protections away.Companies are positioned to conduct this fight in a way that individuals rarely are. Politicians seldom sue for defamation, especially in the heat of a campaign. No matter how damaging the rumors spread by an opponent, they can’t afford the distraction of hashing out the truth about their past in court. And few individuals, public or private, can afford the cost. A business, on the other hand, can bring deeper pockets to the battle—and can point to the tangible pain of lost profit and revenue to show that untruths have consequences.In the case of the voting machine companies, Connolly points out that the allegations took aim at the very heart of their brands: accuracy and reliability. “When you have an attack like that on your core business model, a defamation lawsuit may become a business necessity,” Connolly says. “It’s one of the only ways you can restore your reputation.” The multibillion-dollar question is whether, in protecting that business model, these relatively obscure companies can reshape the rules around accuracy and reliability in public debate.The aftershocks of innuendoThis visualization of data from media-research firm Zignal Labs shows how various unsubstantiated claims about Dominion persisted online.A distrusted industryJohn Poulos started Dominion out of his basement in Toronto in 2003. A Canadian who doesn’t even vote in the U.S., he’d recently moved back home from Silicon Valley after selling his first startup, a telecom technology company. He found his next big idea in the aftermath of the 2000 U.S. presidential election, with its controversies over butterfly ballots and hanging chads. Congress had subsequently passed the Help America Vote Act focused on improving voting technology and accessibility. Poulos had an idea for creating a system that would help blind people vote without compromising the secrecy of their ballots. He named the company after Canada’s Dominion Elections Act of 1920, which expanded women’s suffrage. “We thought that would be a nice homage to helping voters vote,” Poulos says.Dominion voting machines could also be used by sighted voters, and Poulos gradually built a clientele among state and local governments. He recruited a staff dedicated to the company’s democratic mission, if not the “obscene” hours and seven-day election season workweeks. By 2020, Dominion was the second-largest voting-machine business in the United States, with its machines used in 1,500 elections in 28 states and Puerto Rico, and a staff of about 300.But Dominion had joined an industry that was already viewed with suspicion from across the political spectrum. In the push to modernize voting technology, some jurisdictions had upgraded to electronic systems whose traceability was opaque—-particularly in cases in which machines left no paper records. In 2006, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the political scion, environmental attorney, and future anti-vaccination activist, published an article in Rolling Stone questioning whether the 2004 election had been “stolen” by the GOP with help from such machines. In 2008, a Princeton University computer science professor named Andrew Appel demonstrated how to hack certain voting machines using a screwdriver.The paranoia helped set off a rollback to more old-school methods; most machines today, including Dominion’s, generate or tally paper ballots that can be recounted. Still, mistrust kept percolating, particularly after reports of Russian interference dogged the 2016 presidential elections. (That meddling included extensive misinformation campaigns, but investigations found no evidence of voting-system tampering.) Dominion wasn’t immune from the suspicion: Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein sued to review the source code of Dominion and other machines in Wisconsin after her loss there four years ago; that litigation is ongoing.Despite that backdrop of distrust, the 2020 election might have unfolded with little drama for Dominion—if not for Antrim County. That northern Michigan jurisdiction is a Republican stronghold, but on Election Night, and as the vote was counted into Wednesday morning, Biden and down-ballot Democrats appeared to be winning by a landslide. When campaign attorneys brought the anomaly to election officials’ attention, they discovered the problem: There had been a change in the candidates listed on the ballot, but a local official had neglected to reprogram some of the machines—which used Dominion’s software—with the new template. As a result, voters’ selections were essentially transposed down a row in initial tallies, their votes accruing to another party’s candidate.Election officials corrected the human error the same day it was caught; in the end, Trump was the clear winner in Antrim. Antrim “shows that the problems and process leads to the correct result,” says Edward Perez, global director of technology development for the OSET Institute, a nonpartisan nonprofit focused on researching election tech. “It seems a strange circumstance to pick on to show how the election was rigged.”DOUBLE-CHECKED An election worker handles ballots in Phoenix. Arizona was one of the states where investigators sought, but didn’t find, evidence of vote-rigging.USA Network/ReutersThe damage, however, was done, and conspiracy theorists had a kernel of doubt to run with. Dominion’s machines were in use in some of the most closely contested states: Michigan, Georgia, and Arizona, to name a few. On Nov. 6, before the election was officially called, Rep. Paul Gosar, an Arizona Republican, citing the Antrim incident, began tweeting calls to “audit all Dominion software” for its “massive fraud potential.” Calls for investigations grew louder, and President Trump, determined to fight the election results, was happy to amplify them.By the time Powell and Giuliani held their press conference, things had taken a more outlandish turn. Conspiracy-mongers had assigned Dominion a partner in evil: Venezuelan strongman Chávez, who had died in 2013. Powell’s narrative relied significantly on a heavily redacted affidavit from a supposed “Venezuelan whistleblower” who alleged that Smartmatic had built its software to be able to secretly change votes to Chávez, and that Dominion’s system descended from that mold. Both Smartmatic and Dominion vigorously dismiss that narrative. But the story did have a distorted, game-of-Telephone connection to reality that helped it sound more plausible to those inclined to believe it. Smartmatic’s founders were Venezuelans; the federal Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. probed the company’s ties to Venezuela back in 2006; and Dominion had bought a former subsidiary of Smartmatic’s several years after Smartmatic divested it. That thin reed turned into a stick that Powell and Giuliani beat Dominion with. Dominion’s ties to Venezuela have garnered more than 110,000 social media mentions, according to Zignal. (As for Smartmatic, in the 2020 election in the U.S., the only place where its machines were used was Los Angeles.)The bizarre conditions around the election provided particularly fertile ground for skepticism. The combination of a close result and a long vote-counting process—caused by the unprecedented millions who cast absentee ballots owing to COVID-19 concerns—created a tense nationwide spectator sport, with party lawyers, poll watchers, and armchair detectives seeking paths for their guy to eke out a win. “It’s the old cliché: Old fish and old election results smell, because people get suspicious about them,” says Mark Braden, a former chief counsel to the RNC who’s now at the firm BakerHostetler (and who calls the claims against Dominion “fantasyland, total garbage, 100%”). Add a President who had spent months laying the groundwork to cry fraud if he lost, and the climate was ripe for conspiracy theories. “The base is very credulous on these sorts of accusations,” says a Republican attorney. “And Dominion drew the short straw.”Still, while the theory that Dominion machines were flipping votes might have initially seemed to hold water in light of the Antrim County bungle, the bottom fell out as soon as GOP officials went looking for proof in states that Biden won. Charlie Spies, an election law attorney, represented Republican hopeful John James in the 2020 Michigan Senate race. If the Antrim County glitch had carried over into the other counties using Dominion machines in the state, his candidate would have won. “My goal was to find evidence of a problem large enough to have impacted the results,” says Spies. He says he tried to run down every claim raised by Powell, hoping it would help, but all came up short. “Where I get lost on the big conspiracy is, these machines aren’t interconnected,” he says. “And one machine doesn’t change a statewide election.”Where I get lost on the big conspiracy is, these machines aren't interconnected, and one machine doesn't change a statewide election.Charlie Spies, Republican election-law attorneyRepublican campaign attorneys and candidates across the country were trying to do the same thing. In Arizona, lawyers from both in and out of state descended to investigate Dominion’s machines, but after nearly a week of digging and interviewing technicians and election workers, they found no statistical anomalies, improper Internet connections, nor any other problems.Over in Virginia, Republican party officials and attorneys were surprised to hear Giuliani reference fraud in their state during the Nov. 19 press conference; they had heard nothing of the sort from their own poll watchers. When they followed up with the Trump campaign, no one got back to them. If there were examples of malfeasance, the officials thought it was odd not to be asked to investigate them. “We could never get anyone to tell us what proof they had,” says Chris Marston, a Republican campaign attorney and founder of Election CFO, a campaign-finance compliance company. “But we feel comfortable there was no widespread machine-based fraud in Virginia.”All along, Powell was making her case, both in the media and behind the scenes. GOP candidates who’d lost their races say they were fielding calls from Powell and her team, urging them to “keep on fighting,” that she was “going to break this wide open” and that they’d “better get on board.” But when campaign lawyers asked for evidence, “we’d never get anything back other than general, ‘It’s bad, they cheated, it was stolen,’ ” says a Republican attorney. “There’s no ‘there’ there,” says another.“Air-gapped”What the Republican operatives were—or weren’t—finding was exactly what experts in voting systems expected. In the new, lower-tech era, most voting machines including Dominion’s are designed to operate fully offline, with no connection to the Internet—they’re “air-gapped,” to use the cybersecurity term. Appel—the Princeton computer scientist who has hacked a voting machine with a screwdriver—notes that there are still at least a couple of ways to compromise the new breed remotely, generally involving a touchpoint to the Internet. One would be to install malicious software on the machines before they’re shipped out from warehouses, such as through a phishing attack on a Dominion employee. Another way would be to hack the laptops that county officials use to program the machines at a local level, which typically involves uploading the ballot data to a memory card or thumb drive and transferring that—with the addition of a fraudulent algorithm—to the machines. If pulled off successfully, the machines could be “hacked in a networked way, where one hack covers thousands of machines,” Appel says.Still, would-be hackers face formidable obstacles. One is that under current practice, even the programming laptops are, except in rare lapses, not connected to the Internet, making them virtually inaccessible to a remote hacker. Second, even if an attacker did install fraudulent vote-switching software on machines, it’s extremely unlikely that it would escape discovery during the various certification and accuracy testing protocols the machines undergo ahead of an election, or in the postelection audits that certain states conduct. “There are many, many places where a bad actor would have to maintain the lack of detection, again and again and again and again,” explains OSET’s Perez. And at the end of the day, if the paper ballots match the machine tallies—as they did in the states that conducted 2020 recounts—“that’s pretty strong evidence that the voting computers weren’t hacked,” says Appel.If a hack like the one Powell and Giuliani were describing were to take place, in other words, 2020 is the year it would have been caught. Between November and January, there have been recounts or audits of votes involving more than 1,000 Dominion machines—including the third recount, by hand, of Georgia’s 5 million-plus ballots. None found errors or irregularities on any meaningful scale.“There are many, many places where a bad actor would have to maintain the lack of detection, again and again and again and again,” to rig voting machines.Edward Perez, The Oset InstituteAs legal challenges regarding more mundane allegations fell apart soon after the election, other law firms dropped the Trump campaign as a client—consolidating the campaign’s legal strategy, and its legal complaints, in the hands of Giuliani and allies like Powell. Powell had built a reputation for her expertise in appeals litigation; she didn’t lack for legal experience or acumen.But the evidence that Powell and her team attached to legal briefs in suits related to Dominion often reads like a hodgepodge of disconnected headlines. Some documents cite a computer game found downloaded onto a laptop running Dominion software as evidence of potential hacking; others point to unusually high voter turnout numbers as proof of something fishy. In some affidavits, witnesses explain that they are basing their testimony on things they found in Google searches. In December, when an Arizona judge dismissed one of Powell’s cases in its entirety, she concluded, “Allegations that find favor in the public sphere of gossip and innuendo cannot be a substitute for earnest pleadings and procedure in federal court.” To critics, the evidence Powell and her allies have aired against Dominion, both in court and in the media, is at best an illustration of confirmation bias—conspiracy theorists citing one-off irregularities as proof of that conspiracy, without connecting any dots.Put another way, just because a voting machine could be hacked doesn’t mean it was—a distinction that Mark Braden finds himself explaining a lot lately. Braden, the former chief counsel to the RNC, has worked on roughly 100 recounts in his career, more, he thinks, than any other Republican lawyer in the country. He’s recently been fielding calls from others in the party wondering about the Dominion allegations, and he’s been trying to shoot them down. “They think, ‘Oh, there’s so much smoke, there must be some fire,’ ” Braden says. “And the answer is, everyone just has clouds in their mind. It’s not smoke—these are just clouds of confusion.”By Christmas of 2020, more than 50 lawsuits from the Trump campaign and its associates alleging election improprieties had been dismissed—and the legal and cybersecurity establishments had increasingly shrugged off the Dominion story. Before leaving office in December, Attorney General William Barr said said that after federal investigations, “to date, we have not seen fraud on a scale that could have effected a different outcome in the election.” In March, the DOJ along with the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) declassified a joint report that addressed “multiple public claims that one or more foreign governments—including Venezuela, Cuba, or China” controlled voting machines and manipulated vote counts. Upon investigation, the report said, the agencies “determined that they are not credible.”Fact, opinion, and newsAmid all the hate mail and death threats last fall, Poulos received an unexpected message from a Greek Orthodox priest in Long Island, N.Y. The priest had correctly guessed Poulos’s denomination and reached out to offer support. The men have never met, but they’ve spoken a handful of times, and the priest has sent Poulos books, from the spiritual to historical. “We’d have these conversations about how this is not the first time in history that something unfair has happened, and it seems hopeless,” Poulos recalls. “And he kept reminding me that in truth, we are on the right side of history.” A catharsis came in one of the counseling sessions, when the priest quoted Winston Churchill: “When you’re going through hell, keep going.” For Poulos and his employees, that phrase is now a sort of mantra.To a certain degree, Dominion’s pushback is already having its desired effect. In November and December, Dominion and Smartmatic sent warning letters to Fox News about the allegations the network was airing. After that, Fox ran some “fact-checking” segments including an interview with OSET’s Perez debunking the claims. Powell, Giuliani, and the story itself have largely receded from the network since early January.The story continues to ricochet around conservative media and social media, however, and Poulos and his colleagues say the damage endures. Dominion, as a privately held company, does not disclose its finances, but its latest lawsuit against Fox enumerates some of the harm it claims to have suffered, including anticipated voting-machine deals in Ohio and Louisiana that have been put on ice since the election. The damages the company is requesting include $600 million in lost profits, as well as lost enterprise value of at least $1 billion, along with hundreds of thousands of dollars spent on security and “combatting the disinformation campaign.” Although the many zeroes have raised some eyebrows, Clare, Dominion’s attorney, defends the calculations. “The scope and the reach and the number of people that heard this and believed it and acted upon it is something that is just unprecedented in the 25-plus years that I’ve been doing this.”To win in court, Dominion’s and Smartmatic’s lawyers know it won’t be enough to prove the Big Lie isn’t true. Because the companies will likely be considered “public figures” in the eyes of the law (corporations almost always are) there’s a higher bar to clear to show defamation: They’ll need to prove the presence of actual malice—that the speaker of the false information either lied knowingly or with a reckless disregard for the truth. That means the trial could turn on a question that’s particularly urgent in an age of incompatible realities and “alternative facts”: Does putting trust in a false narrative count as reckless disregard for truth?Excerpted from US Dominion Inc., Dominion Voting Systems Inc., and Dominion Voting Systems Corporation v. Fox News Network, LLCThe defendants’ responses in the Dominion cases refract this question in different ways. Rudy Giuliani, who has so far represented himself in suits by Dominion and Coomer, did not respond to requests for comment, and his court filings to date give little indication of his strategy. Mike Lindell, the MyPillow CEO, has yet to respond to Dominion in court, but he says he plans to double down on his claims. Lindell says he received a “smoking gun” that he aims to release as part of a later evidence dump, though he declined to let Fortune review it. “We’re going to countersue them with the biggest First Amendment lawsuit in history,” he says, adding, “It’s not defaming if you’re telling the truth about somebody.”Sidney Powell responded to Dominion’s lawsuit in late March with a motion to dismiss. One of the arguments in her brief is particularly provocative: Even if her statements could be proved true or false, it reads, “no reasonable person would conclude that the statements were truly statements of fact.” On one level, that puzzles defamation experts because it seems to undermine Powell’s authority. Sandra Baron, a First Amendment attorney and a senior fellow at the Information Society Project of Yale Law School, thinks it’s a long shot: “The last I looked, that defense worked best for a group of shock jocks—‘nobody takes what we’re saying seriously,’ ” Baron says. “But I think that’s a hard argument for a lawyer to make.” In an interview with Fortune, Powell’s lawyer, Howard Kleinhendler, clarifies the argument somewhat. Powell’s public statements weren’t facts, he argues, but became opinions when she presented testimony of other people she judged to be expert witnesses. Kleinhendler acknowledges that those witnesses’ credentials could have been flimsy, but says that by itself shouldn’t disqualify their arguments, or put Powell at fault. “These expert reports weren’t just idle chatter—they were supported by documents, by screenshots, by analyses,” Kleinhendler says. He and Powell had hoped—and still hope—their documents would have been enough to “warrant discovery” of additional evidence in court.There’s a “very basic mistake” in that argument, says George Freeman, executive director for the Media Law Resource Center who was a longtime libel defense attorney at the New York Times. “Those disclosed facts have to be true,” he says. If they aren’t, “the defense falls apart.” (Powell may also be taken to task, in court, for the vehemence with which she framed those “opinions” as facts. On Lou Dobbs’s eponymous Fox Business primetime show in early December, for example, she told the host, “You would have to be a damn fool and abjectly stupid not to see what happened here, for anybody who’s willing to look at the real evidence.”)The distinction between fact and opinion, and who’s responsible for the accuracy of the former, are bound to be the main themes of the suits against Fox News—undoubtedly the most consequential pieces of the voting-machine litigation. Whatever their outcome, those cases could send ripples throughout the media, attorneys say, redefining the role of organizations in both covering and correcting misinformation. Fox had yet to respond to Dominion’s suit when this article went to press, but its response to Smartmatic offers a look into its strategy. (Fox News declined to make staffers available for interviews for this story.)Last I looked, that defense worked best for a group of shock jocks. But I think that's a hard argument for a lawyer to make.Sandra Baron, The Information Society Project, Yale Law School, on Sidney Powell's legal strategyThe network argues in the Smartmatic case that President Trump’s election challenges were “undeniably newsworthy” and “matters of public concern”—categories of speech which the law affords some greater protection. “If the First Amendment means anything, it means that Fox cannot be held liable for fairly reporting and commenting on competing allegations in a hotly contested and actively litigated election,” Fox said in a statement. Fox also points to the “fact-checking segments” it aired, as well as instances where its own on-air staff said that no evidence of widespread fraud had emerged.The defense Fox appears to be employing, says Freeman, is known as neutral reportage—the idea that news outlets are allowed to report on and restate important claims made by responsible people. Freeman is one of many advocates who argue that the media should have this right. Neutral reportage is a privilege recognized in few courts, however, and in New York, where Fox is based (and being sued by Smartmatic), the courts have rejected it. And even if a court was receptive, attorneys say Fox might still stumble over the neutrality part; after all, a jury will have to weigh the totality of its coverage, and whether it endorsed its guests’ points. Examples of such perceived endorsement pepper the complaints from Dominion and Smartmatic. In November, for example, Dobbs ended a discussion with Powell about Dominion saying he was “glad” she was working “to straighten out all of this. It is a foul mess, and it is far more sinister than any of us could have imagined.” (Fox dropped Dobbs’s show in February—the day after Smartmatic served its lawsuit—but the network says that the cancellation was unrelated to the defamation cases.)If Fox were to lose, Dominion and some mainstream commentators will likely hail the win as a triumph of business against misinformation, a line drawn in the sand between facts and alternative facts—and a possible template for future lawsuits. That may be a be-careful-what-you-wish-for scenario, says Yale’s Baron. The benefits of reining in actually fake news, if you will, could have a chilling effect on the freedom of the press and on some speech in general. “The hope is that it will only chill those who are likely to lose libel suits,” she says. “I think the country may get an opportunity to learn a lot about the limits, for good or for ill, of libel law in the context of this litigation.”Beyond the First Amendment, there are other spheres for holding accountable those responsible for the Big Lie. Powell and Giuliani, along with several other attorneys who filed election challenges, are facing complaints from government officials seeking to disbar them from the legal profession entirely. And some lawmakers who have spread and acted on claims like Powell’s and Giuliani’s are being punished by some donors: Multiple companies have discontinued their donations to the campaigns of lawmakers who declined to certify the validity of the 2020 election. .There’s also the question of whether Dominion’s lawsuits will progress far enough, fast enough, to make a difference. Ironically enough, the toxic information climate exemplified by the Dominion narrative may make it harder to get to the truth. Once it goes to trial, it may be a challenge to empanel enough jurors whose views have not been tainted by the pervasive allegations. Any definitive verdict is likely three to four years down the road, which means there could be another presidential election before a ruling can vindicate the voting machine companies. Should Dominion prevail, its less clear whether it will even make a difference in the minds of the millions for whom the conspiracy theories are gospel.For Poulos, the issues around integrity and democracy outweigh those concerns. He says Dominion, which is paying the lawyer bills out of its own coffers, has enough runway to pursue the litigation for years and does not plan to settle. “We are not initiating claims to reach a settlement agreement where the truth can’t come out,” he says. “That’s just not of interest to us.” In the meantime, Poulos and his colleagues have been embracing a different mission: explaining to American voters how their elections work. As long as most jurisdictions are using paper ballots—which electoral experts expect even the few holdouts will eventually adopt—there’s a simple path to peace of mind. Nicole Nollette, the Dominion executive, has made it a priority to clear up misinformation. “You don’t need to take our word for it,” she constantly explains. Not when the proof is right there: “You can recount the paper ballots by hand; you can recount them by a machine,” she says. In the future, more states just might—which could be a more effective way to quell conspiracy theories before they catch fire.This article appears in the April/May issue of Fortune with the headline, "Dominion Voting: Big lies vs. big lawsuits."Dive into stories from Fortune’s print edition:Just how green is your “green” fund?The pandemic has derailed women’s careers and livelihoods. Is America giving up on them?Underrated or overrated? Executives rank the business world’s top CEOsBig Lies vs. Big Lawsuits: Why Dominion Voting is suing Fox News and a host of Trump alliesInside Brunello Cucinelli’s vision for “humanistic capitalism”