MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell and his company filed suit against the country and officials Tuesday, demanding that his cell phone be returned after the FBI confiscated it last week.
FBI agents’ phone search and seizure violated Lindell’s constitutional rights, urging the Minnesota U.S. District Court to order that his device and any data accessed from its cell service provider be given back to him, according to the lawsuit. It called for barring federal authorities from accessing or releasing the phone’s information and looped in Alan Dershowitz as counsel for Lindell.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – MAY 26: Alan Dershowitz attends the Friars Club gala honoring Tracy Morgan with the Entertainment Icon Award at The Ziegfeld Ballroom on May 26, 2022 in New York City. Rob Kim/Getty Images
Agents served Lindell the phone’s warrant at a Minnesota Hardee’s drive-thru last Tuesday morning and probed him about matters related to Mesa County Clerk Tina Peters, his associate Douglas Frank, Dominion Voting Systems and other subjects, the lawsuit said. Peters currently faces state charges in connection with a scheme allegedly permitting unauthorized access to voting machines, according to CNN. (RELATED: January 6 Committee Hired Consultant Who May Have ‘Huge’ Conflict Of Interest)
Warrant documents featured on his show “The Lindell Report” last Tuesday evening indicated investigators looked for evidence of people including Lindell, Frank and Peters allegedly running afoul of federal anti-identity theft and intentional protected computer damage laws, The Washington Post reported. Frank has contended he found secret algorithms used to rig the 2020 election and claimed Trump won.
FBI personnel reportedly seized Frank’s phone at an airport Thursday.
“Our constitutionally protected right to speak and to organize with others who share our beliefs under the First Amendment is violated when the government takes actions, such as issuing a warrant, that has the effect of, and is for the purpose of, deterring us from criticizing the government,” Lindell counsel Patrick McSweeney told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “That is the campaign that Merrick Garland and Christopher Wray are waging against many Americans.”
“We do not have comment,” an FBI representative said after the DCNF inquired.
UPDATE: this story was updated to include responses from the FBI and McSweeney.
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