MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell claimed the FBI seized his phone outside a Hardees: ‘My hearing aids run off this!’
Mike Lindell #MikeLindell
CEO of MyPillow Mike Lindell is in the rally at west steps of Colorado State Capitol building in Denver, Colorado on Tuesday, April 5, 2022.Hyoung Chang/MediaNews Group/The Denver Post via Getty Images
Mike Lindell said FBI agents seized his phone as part of a warrant tampering with Dominion voting machines.
In a video posted to Facebook, Lindell explained how the search warrant was served outside a Hardee’s restaurant.
The warrant includes authorization to seize records related to damaging, theft, or misappropriation of Dominion machines.
During a Facebook broadcast on Tuesday night, MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell claimed the FBI had been “weaponized” against him when they executed a lawful search warrant to seize his phone.
According to a copy of a subpoena uploaded by Lindell, his cell phone was taken by federal agents Tuesday as part of a warrant seeking records related to the “authorization or lack of authorization to damage or modify any Dominion computerized voting system.” The investigation was also related to “any attempted misappropriation, theft, conversion, transfer, or exfiltration of any proprietary hardware, software or other data” related to the voting machines.
The FBI did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In a comment to The Daily Beast, the Denver FBI field office said, “without commenting on this specific matter, I can confirm that the FBI was at that location executing a search warrant authorized by a federal judge,” but said it could not comment on individual cases.
“They want to know about Dominion and Mesa County in Colorado,” Lindell told Insider, referencing the ongoing investigation into Mesa County clerk Tina Peters, a pro-Trump Colorado election official accused of facilitating an election data leak.
Lindell has been linked to Peters, with the latter having been accused this April of accepting a private plane ride from the pillow CEO. Lindell also told Insider he’s been helping to pay off Peters’ legal fees, with some funds coming from his “personal money” redirected through a fundraising platform called the Lindell Legal Offense Fund.
Four federal agents, he said, “cornered” him outside a Hardee’s restaurant and indicated they had no intention of arresting the businessman.
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“‘We just want your phone,'” Lindell recalled the agents saying.
Lindell also recounted during a broadcast on Tuesday how he protested against the seizure of his phone by agents.
“I go: ‘No. My whole company — I run five companies off that, I don’t have a computer,'” Lindell said. “My hearing aids run off this! Everything runs off my phone!”
“If they had arrested me, you could’ve come and visited me in jail! We could’ve done a story!” Lindell told Insider reporter Cheryl Teh.
Coming out strongly in support of Lindell was former President Donald Trump — who was himself last month the subject of an FBI raid of his Mar-a-Lago residence in Florida.
“Mike Lindell, ‘THE Pillow Guy,’ was just raided by the FBI. We are now officially living in a Weaponized Police State, Rigged Elections, and all. Our Country is a laughing stock all over the World,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “The majesty of the United States is gone. Can’t let this happen. TAKE BACK AMERICA!”
Lindell continues to be highly involved in pushing Trump’s false claims of voter fraud. In June, he told Insider he tried to secure a spot to publicly testify before the House panel investigating the Capitol riot but said the panel didn’t want to talk to him.
Lindell is also bankrolling a nationwide effort to stop the use of electronic voting machines. He is also embroiled in a $1.3 billion lawsuit filed against him by the voting-technology company Dominion and a suit filed by the voting-systems company Smartmatic.
Read the original article on Business Insider