MINNEAPOLIS – Financial doom appears to loom over MyPillow inventor Mike Lindell for a reckless offer of $5 million for anyone who could disprove his logic that China interfered with the 2020 election. A new decision by Federal Judge John Tunheim went against Lindell. The judge ordered him to make good on the $5 million offer. He gave Lindell 30 days to pay the Nevada software engineer who debunked the China theory — plus 2-1/2 years interest. “Of course we’re going to appeal it,” Lindell said. “This guy doesn’t have a dime coming.” Although $5 million once would have been a drop the bucket of Lindell’s self-made fortune, he’s now financially beleaguered with problems related to his devoted support of the now also financially beleaguered ex-President Trump.
A debt or not?
In 2021 Lindell launched a wobbly right-wing television network out of Mitchell, South Dakota. In what first seemed to be an ill-considered on-air moment of bravado, Lindell offered $5 million to anybody who could disprove his logic that China had interfered with the 2020 election. He called it the “Prove Mike Wrong Challenge.” He then hammered away at the offer. In Nevada a computer whiz, Robert Zeidman, examined Lindell’s supporting data and found it irrelevant. Zeidman asked for the $5 million prize. “Over my dead body,” Lindell replied. The two agreed to arbitration. The arbitration panel found for Zeidman. Lindell appealed. Now Judge Tunheim has refused to intervene. Courts have only limited authority to overrule arbitration awards, he said.
Lindell’s fiscal health
Whether Lindell can afford to pay Zeidman is unclear. Zeidman’s beach-of-contract suit was filed not against Lindell personally but against a hybrid legal shield entity, Lindell Management LLC. But are any Lindell properties still solvent? Although once a self-made millionaire, Lindell has taken financial hits for being on the Trump bandwagon of claims of election fraud:
> Dominion Voting Systems has sued for $1.3 million for defamatory assertions that it manipulated voting machines.
> Smartmatic, another voting machine company, has sued Lindell and others on similar grounds for $2.7 billion.
> Fox News, which carried advertising for MyPillow for years, has cut him off for hundreds of thousands of dollars in overdue bills.
> All major MyPillow retail outlets, including Kohl’s and Wayfair, have discontinued the product as politically toxic.
> His MyPillow factory, which once employed 1,700. people in Chaska, is running now on a relatively skeletal staff.
> Lindell has unloaded his corporate jet and scaled down a high-flying lifestyle.
> His legal bills, in the millions have gone unpaid.
> He has left his super-upscale Minnesota home to live elsewhere, a necessity, he said, for security reasons. His now digs, however are relatively modest.
Lindell. Although his legal problems stem from zealously backing Trump, the former president ungratefully has left Lindell out to dry financially.
Zeidman. Las Vegas-based software engineer who debunked a claim central to Lindell’s theory that the 2020 election was rigged,
MyPillow collapse
Lindell became a self-made millionaire with incessant claims on late-night television for a miracle product, MyPillow. He guaranteed a deep and restful sleep. When Trump ran for president, Lindell threw his MyPilow recognition into the campaign and even contemplated running for governor of Minnesota himself. When Trump lost the 2020 election, Lindell became one of the most vocal claimants that it all had been rigged. Some claims were whacky on their face, and some were financially damaging. The lawsuits generated millions of dollars in legal bills and still are.