Following are excerpts from Sidney Powell’s lawsuit filed 11/25/2020 alleging massive scheme to rig election for Joe Biden
See this link for full text…
II. EVIDENCE OF FRAUD
B. THE VOTING MACHINES, SECRECY
SOFTWARE USED BY VOTING MACHINES THROUGHOUT GEORGIA IS CRUCIAL
92. These violations of federal and state laws impacted the election of November 3, 2020 and set the predicate for the evidence of deliberate fraudulent conduct, manipulation, and lack of mistake that follows. The commonality and statewide nature of these legal violations renders certification of the legal vote untenable and warrants immediate impoundment of voting machines and software used throughout Georgia for expert inspection and retrieval of the software.
93. An Affiant, who is a network & information cyber-security expert, under sworn testimony explains that after studying the user manual for Dominion Voting Systems Democracy software, he learned that the information about scanned ballots can be tracked inside the software system for Dominion:
(a) When bulk ballot scanning and tabulation begins, the “ImageCast Central” workstation operator will load a batch of ballots into the scanner feed tray and then start the scanning procedure within the software menu. The scanner then begins to scan the ballots which were loaded into the feed tray while the “ImageCast Central” software application tabulates votes in real-time. Information about scanned ballots can be tracked inside the “ImageCast Central” software application.
(See attached hereto Exh 22, Declaration of Ronald Watkins, at par. 11).
94. Affiant further explains that the central operator can remove or discard batches of votes. “After all of the ballots loaded into the scanner’s feed tray have been through the scanner, the “ImageCast Central” operator will remove the ballots from the tray then have the option to either “Accept Batch” or “Discard Batch” on the scanning menu …. “(Id. at par. 8).
95. Affiant further testifies that the Dominion/ Smartmatic user manual itself makes clear that the system allows for threshold settings to be set to mark all ballots as “problem ballots” for discretionary determinations on where the vote goes. It states:
During the scanning process, the “ImageCast Central” software will detect how much of a percent coverage of the oval was filled in by the voter. The Dominion customer determines the thresholds of which the oval needs to be covered by a mark in order to qualify as a valid vote. If a ballot has a marginal mark which did not meet the specific thresholds set by the customer, then the ballot is considered a “problem ballot” and may be set aside into a folder named “NotCastImages”. Through creatively tweaking the oval coverage threshold settings it should be possible to set thresholds in such a way that a non-trivial amount of ballots are marked “problem ballots” and sent to the “NotCastImages” folder. It is possible for an administrator of the ImageCast Central work station to view all images of scanned ballots which were deemed “problem ballots” by simply navigating via the standard “Windows File Explorer” to the folder named “NotCastImages” which holds ballot scans of “problem ballots”. It is possible for an administrator of the “ImageCast Central” workstation to view and delete any individual ballot scans from the “NotCastImages” folder by simply using the standard Windows delete and recycle bin functions provided by the Windows 10 Pro operating system. (Id. at pars. 9-10).
96. The Affiant further explains the vulnerabilities in the system when the copy of the selected ballots that are approved in the Results folder are made to a flash memory card – and that is connected to a Windows computer stating:
It is possible for an administrator of the “ImageCast Central” workstation to view and delete any individual ballot scans from the “NotCastImages” folder by simply using the standard Windows delete and recycle bin functions provided by the Windows 10 Pro operating system. … The upload process is just a simple copying of a “Results” folder containing vote tallies to a flash memory card connected to the “Windows 10 Pro” machine. The copy process uses the standard drag-n-drop or copy/paste mechanisms within the ubiquitous “Windows File Explorer”. While a simple procedure, this process may be error prone and is very vulnerable to malicious administrators. Id. at par. 11-13 (emphasis supplied).
97. It was announced on “Monday, [July 29, 2019], [that] Governor Kemp awarded a contract for 30,000 new voting machines to Dominion Voting Systems, scrapping the state’s 17-year-old electronic voting equipment and replacing it with touchscreens that print out paper ballots.”12 Critics are quoted: “Led by Abrams, Democrats fought the legislation and pointed to cybersecurity experts who warned it would leave Georgia’s elections susceptible to hacking and tampering.” And “Just this week, the Fair Fight voting rights group started by [Stacy] Abrams launched a television ad critical of the bill. In a statement Thursday, the group called it “corruption at its worst” and a waste of money on “hackable voting machines.”
Georgia Buys New Voting Machines for 2020 Presidential Election, by Mark Niesse, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, July 30, 2019, https://www.ajc.com/news/state–regional-govt–politics/georgia-awards-contract-for-new-election-system-dominion-voting/tHh3V8KZnZivJoVzZRLO4O/
98. It was further reported in 2019 that the new Dominion Voting Machines in Georgia “[w]ith Georgia’s current voting system, there’s no way to guarantee that electronic ballots accurately reflect the choices of voters because there’s no paper backup to verify results, with it being reported that:
(a) Recounts are meaningless on the direct-recording electronic voting machines because they simply reproduce the same numbers they originally generated.
(b) But paper ballots alone won’t protect the sanctity of elections on the new touchscreens, called ballot-marking devices.
(c) The new election system depends on voters to verify the printed text of their choices on their ballots, a step that many voters might not take. The State Election Board hasn’t yet created regulations for how recounts and audits will be conducted. And paper ballots embed selections in bar codes that are only readable by scanning machines, leaving Georgians uncertain whether the bar codes match their votes.
Georgia Governor Inks Law to Replace Voting Machines, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, AJC News Now, by Greg Bluestein and Mark Niesse, June 14, 2019; Credit: Copyright 2019 The Associated Press, June 2019.
As part of the scheme and artifice to defraud the plaintiffs, the candidates and the voters of undiminished and unaltered voting results in a free and legal election, the Defendants and other persons known and unknown committed the following violations of law:
50 U.S.C. § 20701 requires the retention and preservation of records and papers by officers of elections under penalty of fine and imprisonment:
§ 20701. Retention and preservation of records and papers by officers of elections; deposit with custodian; penalty for violation
Every officer of election shall retain and preserve, for a period of twenty-two months from the date of any general, special, or primary election of which candidates for the office of President, Vice President, presidential elector, Member of the Senate, Member of the House of Representatives, or Resident Commissioner from the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico are voted for, all records and papers which come into his possession relating to any application, registration, payment of poll tax, or other act requisite to voting in such election, except that, when required by law, such records and papers may be delivered to another officer of election and except that, if a State or the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico designates a custodian to retain and preserve these records and papers at a specified place, then such records and papers may be deposited with such custodian, and the duty to retain and preserve any record or paper so deposited shall devolve upon such custodian. Any officer of election or custodian who willfully fails to comply with this section shall be fined not more than $1,000 or imprisoned not more than one year, or both. 50 U.S.C.§ 20701.
99. In the primaries it was confirmed that, “The rapid introduction of new technologies and processes in state voting systems heightens the risk of foreign interference and insider tampering. That’s true even if simple human error or local maneuvering for political advantage are more likely threats
100. A Penn Wharton Study from 2016 concluded that “Voters and their representatives in government, often prompted by news of high-profile voting problems, also have raised concerns about the reliability and integrity of the voting process, and have increasingly called for the use of modern technology such as laptops and tablets to improve convenience.”
101. As evidence of the defects or features of the Dominion Democracy Suite, as described above, the same Dominion Democracy Suite was denied certification in Texas by the Secretary of State on January 24, 2020 specifically because of a lack of evidence of efficiency and accuracy and to be safe from fraud or unauthorized manipulation.
See Threats to Georgia Elections Loom Despite New Paper Ballot Voting, By Mark Niesse, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and (The AP, Vote-by-Mail worries: A leaky pipeline in many states, August 8, 2020).
Penn Wharton Study by Matt Caufield, The Business of Voting, July 2018.
Attached hereto, Exh. 23, copy of Report of Review of Dominion Voting Systems Democracy Suite 5.5-A Elections Division by the Secretary of State’s office, Elections Division, January 24, 2020.
102. Plaintiffs have since learned that the “glitches” in the Dominion system–that have the uniform effect of taking votes from Trump and shifting them to Biden—have been widely reported in the press and confirmed by the analysis of independent experts.
103. Plaintiffs can show, through expert and fact witnesses that:
c. Dominion/ Smartmatic Systems Have Massive End User Vulnerabilities.
1. Users on the ground have full admin privileges to machines and software. Having been created to “rig” elections, the Dominion system is designed to facilitate vulnerability and allow a select few to determine which votes will be counted in any election. Workers were responsible for moving ballot data from polling place to the collector’s office and inputting it into the correct folder. Any anomaly, such as pen drips or bleeds, results in a ballot being rejected. It is then handed over to a poll worker to analyze and decide if it should count. This creates massive opportunity for purely discretionary and improper vote “adjudication.”
2. Affiant witness (name redacted for security reasons), in his sworn testimony explains he was selected for the national security guard detail of the President of Venezuela, and that he witnessed the creation of Smartmatic for the purpose of election vote manipulation to insure Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez never lost an election and he saw it work. Id.
“The purpose of this conspiracy was to create and operate a voting system that could change the votes in elections from votes against persons running the Venezuelan government to votes in their favor in order to maintain control of the government.” (See Exh. 2, pars. 6, 9, 10).
104. Smartmatic’s incorporators and inventors have backgrounds evidencing their foreign connections, including Venezuela and Serbia, specifically its identified inventors:
Inventors: Lino Iglesias, Roger Pinate, Antonio Mugica, Paul Babic, Jeffrey Naveda, Dany Farina, Rodrigo Meneses, Salvador Ponticelli, Gisela Goncalves, Yrem Caruso.
105. The presence of Smartmatic in the United States—owned by foreign nationals, and Dominion, a Canadian company with its offices such as the Office of General Counsel in Germany, would have to be approved by CFIUS. CFIUS was created in 1988 by the Exon-Florio Amendment to the Defense Production Act of 1950. CFIUS’ authorizing statute was amended by the Foreign Investment and National Security Act of 2007 (FINSA).
As amended, section 721 of the DPA directs “the President, acting through [CFIUS],” to review a “covered transaction to determine the effects of the transaction on the national security of the United States.” 50 U.S.C. app. § 2170(b)(1)(A). Section 721 defines a covered transaction as “any merger, acquisition, or takeover …, by or with any foreign person which could result in foreign control of any person engaged in interstate commerce in the United States.” Id. § 2170(a)(3). Ralls Corp. v. Comm. on Foreign Inv., 758 F.3d 296, 302, 411 U.S. App. D.C. 105, 111, (2014). Review of covered transactions under section 721 begins with CFIUS. As noted, CFIUS is chaired by the Treasury Secretary and its members include the heads of various federal agencies and other high-ranking Government officials with foreign policy, national security and economic responsibilities.
106. Then Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney wrote October 6, 2006 to the Secretary of Treasury, Henry M. Paulson, Jr., Objecting to approval of Dominion/Smartmatic by CFIUS because of its corrupt Venezuelan origination, ownership and control. (See attached hereto as Exh. 24, Carolyn Maloney Letter of October 6, 2006). Our own government has long known of this foreign interference on our most important right to vote, and it had either responded with incompetence, negligence, willful blindness, or abject corruption. In every CFIUS case, there are two TS/SCI reports generated. One by the ODNI on the threat and one by DHS on risk to critical infrastructure. Smartmatic was a known problem when it was nonetheless approved by CFIUS.
107. The Wall Street Journal in 2006 did an investigative piece and found that, “Smartmatic came to prominence in 2004 when its machines were used in an election to recall President Chávez, which Mr. Chávez won handily — and which the Venezuelan opposition said was riddled with fraud. Smartmatic put together a consortium to conduct the recall elections, including a company called Bizta Corp., in which Smartmatic owners had a large stake. For a time, the Venezuelan government had a 28% stake in Bizta in exchange for a loan.’…
“Bizta paid off the loan in 2004, and Smartmatic bought the company the following year. But accusations of Chávez government control of Smartmatic never ended, especially since Smartmatic scrapped a simple corporate structure, in which it was based in the U.S. with a Venezuelan subsidiary, for a far more complex arrangement. The company said it made the change for tax reasons, but critics, including Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D., N.Y.) and TV journalist Lou Dobbs, pounded the company for alleged links to the Chávez regime. Id. Since its purchase by Smartmatic, Sequoia’s sales have risen sharply to a projected $200 million in 2006, said Smartmatic’s chief executive, Anthony Mugica.” Id.
108. Indeed, Mr. Cobucci testified, through his sworn affidavit, that he born in Venezuela, is cousins with Antonio (‘Anthony’) Mugica, and he has
See WSJ.com, Smartmatic to Sell U.S. Unit, End Probe into Venezuelan Links, by Bob Davis, 12/22/2006,
personal knowledge of the fact that Anthony Mugica incorporated Smartmatic in the U.S. in 2000 with other family members in Venezuela listed as owners. He also has personal knowledge that Anthony Mugica manipulated Smartmatic to ensure the election for Chavez in the 2004 Referendum in Venezuela. He also testified, through his sworn affidavit, that Anthony Mugica received tens of millions of dollars from 2003- 2015 from the Venezuelan government to ensure Smartmatic technology would be implemented around the world, including in the U.S. (See attached hereto, Exh. 25, Juan Carlos Cobucci Aff.)
109. Another Affiant witness testifies that in Venezuela, she was in an official position related to elections and witnessed manipulations of petitions to prevent a removal of President Chavez and because she protested, she was summarily dismissed. Corroborating the testimony of our secret witness, and our witness Mr. Cobucci, cousin of Anthony Mugica, who began Smartmatic, and this witness explains the vulnerabilities of the electronic voting system and Smartmatica to such manipulations. (See Exh. 3, Diaz Cardozo Aff).
110. Specific vulnerabilities of the systems in question that have been documented or reported include:
a. Barcodes can override the voters’ vote: As one University of California, Berkeley study shows, “In all three of these machines [including Dominion Voting Systems] the ballot marking printer is in the same paper path as the mechanism to deposit marked ballots into an attached ballot box. This opens up a very serious security vulnerability: the voting machine can make the paper ballot (to add votes or spoil already-cast votes) after the last time the voter sees the paper, and then deposit that marked ballot into the ballot box without the possibility of detection.” (See Exh. 7). 21
b. Voting machines were able to be connected to the internet by way of laptops that were obviously internet accessible. If one laptop was connected to the internet, the entire precinct was compromised.
c. We … discovered that at least some jurisdictions were not aware that their systems were online,” said Kevin Skoglund, an independent security consultant who conducted the research with nine others, all of them long-time security professionals and academics with expertise in election security. Vice. August 2019.
Ballot Marking Devices (BMDs) Cannot Assure the Will of the Voters, Andrew W. Appel, Richard T. DeMillo, University of California, Berkeley, 12/27/2019.
Exclusive: Critical U.S. Election Systems Have Been Left Exposed Online Despite Official Denials, Motherboard Tech by Vice, by Kim Zetter, August 8, 2019,
d. October 6, 2006 – Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney called on Secretary of Treasury Henry Paulson to conduct an investigation into Smartmatic based on its foreign ownership and ties to Venezuela. (See Exh. 24)
e. Congresswoman Maloney wrote that “It is undisputed that Smartmatic is foreign owned and it has acquired Sequoia … Smartmatica now acknowledged that Antonio Mugica, a Venezuelan businessman has a controlling interest in Smartmatica, but the company has not revealed who all other Smartmatic owners are.” Id.
f. Dominion “got into trouble” with several subsidiaries it used over alleged cases of fraud. One subsidiary is Smartmatic, a company “that has played a significant role in the U.S. market over the last decade,” according to a report published by UK-based AccessWire23.
g. Litigation over Smartmatic “glitches” alleges they impacted the 2010 and 2013 mid-term elections in the Philippines, raising questions of cheating and fraud. An independent review of the source codes used in the machines found multiple problems, which concluded inventory provided by Smartmatic is inadequate, … which brings into question the software credibility…”
See The software Voting Technology Companies in the U.S. – Their Histories and Present Contributions, Access Wire, August 10, 2017.
h. Dominion acquired Sequoia Voting Systems as well as Premier Election Solutions (formerly part of Diebold, which sold Premier to ES&S in 2009, until antitrust issues forced ES&S to sell Premier, which then was acquired by Dominion).
i. Dominion entered into a 2009 contract with Smartmatic and provided Smartmatic with the PCOS machines (optical scanners) that were used in the 2010 Philippine election—the biggest automated election run by a private company. The international community hailed the automation of that first election in the Philippines.26 The results’ transmission reached 90% of votes four hours after polls closed and Filipinos knew for the first time who would be their new president on Election Day. In keeping with local election law requirements, Smartmatic and Dominion were required to provide the source code of the voting machines prior to elections so that it could be independently verified.
The Business of Voting, Penn Wharton, Caufield, p. 16.
Smartmatic-TIM running out of time to fix glitches, ABS-CBN News, May 4, 2010
j. In late December of 2019, three Democrat Senators, Warren, Klobuchar, Wyden, and House Member Mark Pocan wrote about their ‘particularized concerns that secretive & “trouble -plagued companies”’ “have long skimped on security in favor of convenience,” in the context of how they described the voting machine systems that three large vendors – Election Systems & Software, Dominion Voting Systems, & Hart InterCivic – collectively provide voting machines & software that facilitate voting for over 90% of all eligible voters in the U.S.” (See attached hereto as Exh. 26, copy of Senator Warren, Klobuchar, Wyden’s December 6, 2019 letter).
k. Senator Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) said the findings [insecurity of voting systems] are “yet another damning indictment of the profiteering election vendors, who care more about the bottom line than protecting our democracy.” It’s also an indictment, he said, “of the notion that important cybersecurity decisions should be left entirely to county. Presumably the machiens were not altered following submission of the code.
LONDON, ENGLAND / ACCESSWIRE / August 10, 2017, Voting Technology Companies in the U.S. – Their Histories and Present Contributions election offices, many of whom do not employ a single cybersecurity specialist.”
111. An analysis of the Dominion software system by a former US Military Intelligence expert concludes that the system and software have been accessible and were certainly compromised by rogue actors, such as Iran and China. By using servers and employees connected with rogue actors and hostile foreign influences combined with numerous easily discoverable leaked credentials, Dominion neglectfully allowed foreign adversaries to access data and intentionally provided access to their infrastructure in order to monitor and manipulate elections, including the most recent one in 2020. (See Exh. 7).
112. An expert witness in pending litigation in the United States District Court, Northern District Court of Georgia, Atlanta Div., 17-cv-02989 specifically testified to the acute security vulnerabilities, among other facts, by declaration filed on October 4, 2020, (See Exh. 4B, Document 959-4 attached hereto, paragraph. 18 and 20 of p. 28, Exh. 4, Hursti Declaration). wherein he testified or found:
Exclusive: Critical U.S. Election Systems Have Been Left Exposed Online Despite Official Denials, Motherboard Tech by Vice, by Kim Zetter, August 8, 2019,
1) The failure of the Dominion software “to meet the methods and processes for national standards for managing voting system problems and should not be accepted for use in a public election under any circumstances.”
2) In Hursti’s declaration he explained that “There is evidence of remote access and remote troubleshooting which presents a grave security implication and certified identified vulnerabilities should be considered an “extreme security risk.” Id. Hari Hursti also explained that USB drives with vote tally information were observed to be removed from the presence of poll watchers during a recent election. Id. The fact that there are no controls of the USB drives was seen recently seen the lack of physical security and compliance with professional standards, ” in one Georgia County, where it is reported that 3,300 votes were found on memory sticks not loaded plus in Floyd county, another 2,600 were unscanned, and the “found votes” reduced Biden’s lead over Donald Trump29.
(a) In the prior case against Dominion, supra, further implicating the secrecy behind the software used in Dominion Systems,
Recount find thousands of Georgia votes, Atlanta Journal-Constitution by Mark Niesse and David Wickert,11/19/20.
Dr. Eric Coomer, a Vice President of Dominion Voting Systems, testified that even he was not sure of what testing solutions were available to test problems or how that was done, “ I have got to be honest, we might be a little bit out of my bounds of understanding the rules and regulations… and in response to a question on testing for voting systems problems in relation to issues identified in 2 counties, he explained that “Your Honor, I’m not sure of the complete test plan… Again Pro V&V themselves determine what test plan in necessary based on their analysis of the code itself.” (Id. at Document 959-4, pages 53, 62 L.25- p. 63 L3).
113. Hursti stated within said Declaration:
“The security risks outlined above – operating system risks, the failure to harden the computers, performing operations directly on the operating systems, lax control of memory cards, lack of procedures, and potential remote access are extreme and destroy the credibility of the tabulations and output of the reports coming from a voting system.”
(See Paragraph 49 of Hursti Declaration).
114. Rather than engaging in an open and transparent process to give credibility to Georgia’s brand-new voting system, the election processes were hidden during the receipt, review, opening, and tabulation of those votes in direct contravention of Georgia’s Election Code and federal law.
115.The House of Representatives passed H.R. 2722 in an attempt to address these very risks identified by Hursti, on June 27, 2019:
This bill addresses election security through grant programs and requirements for voting systems and paper ballots.
The bill establishes requirements for voting systems, including that systems (1) use individual, durable, voter-verified paper ballots; (2) make a voter’s marked ballot available for inspection and verification by the voter before the vote is cast; (3) ensure that individuals with disabilities are given an equivalent opportunity to vote, including with privacy and independence, in a manner that produces a voter-verified paper ballot; (4) be manufactured in the United States; and (5) meet specified cybersecurity requirements, including the prohibition of the connection of a voting system to the internet.