An executive for a voting machine company that has been the target of conspiracy theories in the aftermath of Donald Trump's 2020 election loss and been baselessly accused of swinging the. In counties that used Dominion systems, Biden got 888,259 votes to Trump's 851,069. More:Neighbor recalls warning, countdown before Nashville explosion. The voting rights of more than 55,000 formerly incarcerated Minnesotans were restored on Friday, as Gov. The wishes are that I forever have to look over my shoulder," Coomer said. There is no evidence that suggests that the explosion was election-related. The media intelligence platform Zignal Labs, in an analysis performed at NPR's request, found that misinformation narratives related to vote-by-mail systems alone were mentioned across the media spectrum more than 40 million times since Election Day. The Christmas morning bomb went off on Second Avenue, outside an AT&T transmission building. Posts online claim that the Christmas Day bombing in Nashville was an attempt to cover up election fraud because AT&T was conducting an audit of Dominion Voting Systems machines and that the equipment was recently relocated to the companys building that was damaged in the blast. At its core is the prediction thatan alleged mass arrest ofhigh-profile Democrats and celebritieswould be carried out while now-former President Donald Trump secretly savedthe world from a satanic cult of pedophiles and cannibals. "You may want to read a book some day to learn about my reference to rising like a #phoenix. Dominion Voting Systems, a voting machine manufacturer founded in Canada, made equipment that is used in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania. "And I probably will. All rights reserved. While lawmakers questioned them about foreign influence in their supply chains and whether they would comply with more federal reporting requirements, the presence of modems in some of their tabulators was mentioned but not pursued. The post was flagged as part of Facebooks efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. "Anthony Warner is the bomber. The bomb was located in a recreational vehicle owned by Warner. The posts all tie AT&T with Dominion, holding the explosion to be alleged proof of conspiracy. All quotes delayed a minimum of 15 minutes. Kevin Skoglund, senior technical advisor at the National Election Defense Coalition. The post reads: In Nashville 2 days ago an RV pulled up to a building and over a loud speaker announced to clear the area..the RV then blew up taking half a building with it..oh, minor detail - inside that building were the Dominion voting machines being audited. While the post does not specify which building they believed the machines were held in, a Dominion Voting Systems spokesperson said by email that none of their machines were anywhere in the area of the explosion or were being audited in Nashville that day. This conspiracy theory has been debunked by various experts as reported by Reuters here and other fact checkers including Snopes, Factcheck.org and PolitiFact here , here and here . Fact-checkers have debunked claims that the explosion was the result of a missile strike. Did AT&T Have a Contract to Audit Dominion Voting Systems? False. Social media posts from the event tagged the far-right group the Proud Boys. Staple Street Capital took part in a deal with management to acquire Dominion in 2018 (here and here). Early Christmas morning, police in Nashville came across an RV parked on Second Avenue, outside an AT&T transmission building, whileresponding to reports of shots fired in the area, Metro Nashville Police spokesperson Don Aaron told The Tennessean that day. Lindell told the Minnesota Reformer, that he and a friend were on their way home from duck hunting in Iowa and were in the Hardee's drive through when three cars with four FBI agents surrounded his vehicle. Some of Trump's supporters have focused on Coomer as the supposed evil mastermind. February 28, 2023, 1:26 PM. Shasta will be the first of 40 California counties that used Dominion in the November 2022 election to drop the voting system, Shasta County Clerk/Registrar of Voters Cathy Darling Allen told the . However, he is not tied to Joe Biden and is not his sister Valerie Biden Owens husband. In February, Dominion filed a lawsuit against Lindell and his company, alleging he defamed them by repeatedly claiming to have evidence their voting machines fraudulently flipped votes. No one is currently working out of the building. These are conspiracies manufactured out of whole cloth. Dominion provides election equipment and software to 28 states, including many of the swing states on which Trump has focused his post-election ire. Earlier this week, Skoglund showed NBC three election systems were still online even after officials had been told they were vulnerable. Dominion Voting Systems lost a sale of more than 1,400 new machines on Wednesday after commissioners for Stark County, Ohio, voted down the purchase against a recommendation from the. The post displays a headline from a fabricated story by the Genesius Times, a satirical news website, that reads: "BREAKING: Nashville Bomber died from COVID-19 shortly after blowing himself up. causing widespread communications outages. "I actually am in fear for my safety," Coomer said recently, speaking by video call from an undisclosed location to Colorado Public Radio. Tre Hargett was elected by the Tennessee General Assembly to serve as Tennessees 37th secretary of state in 2009 and re-elected in 2013, 2017, and 2021. Social media users have been sharing content online that claims AT&T had a contract to do a forensic audit on Dominion Voting Systems machines and that the Dec. 25 explosion in Nashville, which damaged an AT&T building, was tied to this audit. Three days later, on November 6th, AT&T named William "Bill" E. Kennard Chairman of its Board of Directors. It wasn't meant to kill people, but to destroy a building. This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. For an optimal experience visit our site on another browser. Heres why:In the wake of theChristmas morning explosion in Nashville, Tenn., a baseless conspiracy theory startedcirculatingonlinethat claims Nashvilles downtown AT&T complex, which was damaged in the blast, had gotten a contract to conduct a "forensic audit" on Dominion Voting Systems machines. Both companies have denied the posts claims, saying that there was no such audit and that Dominions machines were not recently transported to Nashville. The FBI confirmed that a man named Anthony Warner was responsible for the bombing and was killed in the blast. Shortly afterwards, social media users began circulating variants of a conspiracy theory holding that AT&T had been engaged to undertake a "forensic audit of Dominion voting machines," the latter of which were frequent targets of false election fraud claims made by President Donald Trump and his supports after Trump lost his re-election bid in November 2020: The implication of the conspiracy theory was that the explosion had been intended to destroy the machines before they were audited in order to cover up evidence of massive voting fraud. Similar claims have already been debunked by Reuters (here). "I've been threatened more times than I could even count. "Thats an interesting coincidence.". Next theory: The bombing was an attempt to stop an AT&T audit into Dominion software and cover up election corruption. But election integrity advocates worry the disinformation won't truly begin to recede until political leaders such as Trump stop questioning the election's legitimacy. The bomb was located in a recreational vehicle owned by Warner. Full Story. The companys sales manager, John Mealey ( here , here ), also spoke about the rumor to local ABC affiliate WHAM-TV, saying: Its crazy, the amount of misinformation that you see.. Other posts on social media have gone a step further, alleging that Dominion is tied to the bombing through ownership of the affected AT&T building. AT&T and Verizon and so on try and protect as best they can the security of their phone network from the rest of the internet, but its still part of the internet, Appel explained. The bomber was lateridentified by U.S. Attorney Don Cochranas Anthony Warner, 63, according to The Tennessean. The Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has dismissed the claim of an election hacking and vote manipulation operation known as Hammer and Scorecard. (here). Last fall, when ES&S gave NBC News an exclusive tour at its headquarters in Omaha, Neb., Chief Executive Officer Tom Burt defended using modems when asked about the Sprint and Verizon modems seen in ES&S's testing area. "To the misinformed people on @Twitter and @instagram #cityblueimaging does not print #ballots, does not do work for #Phoenixgraphics and was never owned by the owner of #phoenixgraphics," the company wrote on its Facebook page on Dec. 27. Donald Trump went after media mogul Rupert Murdoch and his network Fox News in rants on Truth Social where he once again pushed the baseless and debunked claim that the . On Christmas Day, an RV in Nashville, Tennessee, exploded, severelydamaging many of the buildings around it in the explosion. "So, the explosion just happened to be at the AT&T location where they just so happen to control the cooling system for the super computer and house the dominion voting machines and drives for forensic audit", "Wait, the bombing in Nashville was at the AT&T data center right after they got the contract to audit the Dominion voting machines?,"onefrom Dec. 26 reads. 1995 - 2023 by Snopes Media Group Inc. Facebook post:The Nashville bombing was an attempt to stop an AT&T audit into Dominion software and cover up election corruption. 2023 USA TODAY, a division of Gannett Satellite Information Network, LLC. While the post does not specify which building they believed the machines were held in, a Dominion Voting Systems spokesperson said by email that none of their machines were anywhere in the. Its crazy, the amount of misinformation that you see, Mealy said. There are currently two voting systems which are certified by the State of Florida's Division of Elections. Posted By: Dreadnought, 2/28/2023 9:52:47 PM Dominion Voting Systems' $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox News highlights former House Speaker Paul Ryan's alleged influence over Fox News Channel's (FNC) editorial control, reportedly urging . (Read more about ourpartnership with Facebook.). Smartmatic, a competitor of Dominion's that has also been the subject of wild rumors, has demanded that numerous news networks take back their allegations against it. Videos from law enforcement officials and local businesses show that the explosion occurred on 2nd Avenue North in downtown Nashville. While William Kennard serves on Staple Street Capitals board, he is not one of the companys co-founders as these posts claim (here). It really is. Thats an interesting coincidence.. The post's creator did not respond to USA TODAY's request for comment. Dominion Voting Systems which commands more than a third of the voting-machine market without having Washington lobbyists has hired its first, a high-powered firm that includes a. A Dominion spokeswoman said other company employees have also gone to more secure locations, been threatened and been digitally stalked. "So, the explosion 'just happened . Yet internet sleuths are searching for their own answers, some looking atthin ties toconspiracy theories about the 2020 election as evidence of a broader plot. Dominion Voting Systems CEO John Poulos is not ruling out legal action against President Trump, whose surrogates have spent nearly two months alleging the Nov. 3 election, which Trump lost, may . The accusation started with a conservative activist in Colorado, Joe Oltmann. Some posts take the claim a step further, alleging that the former owner of the building was a board member of a firm that owns Dominion. In August 2021, Dominion Voting Systems programmed machines for the county's upcoming elections. The services and oversight found in the Secretary of State's office reach every department and agency in state government. The conspiracy theory appears to have originated in a tweet by Lin Wood, an attorney and Trump supporter, who has pushed a number of false election claims. Heres more information on Facebooks fact-checking program: https://www.facebook.com/help/1952307158131536, Connect with the definitive source for global and local news. Their evidence: a grainy black-and-white video. It is true Kennard serves on the board of Staple Street Capital (not Staple Street execs as the posts say). In a letter obtained by NBC News sent to the EAC on Tuesday, the nonprofit public interest group Free Speech for People and the National Election Defense Coalition asked the agency to look into whether ES&S violated agency regulations by implying that DS200 voting machines with modems are EAC certified. On Dec. 27, U.S. Attorney Don Cochran said the explosion appeared to be a suicide bombing carried out by a Warner. There is no evidence to support the claim that the explosionin Nashville and fire in Rochester, New York,that occurred around the holidays point toward a broader conspiracy to hide election malfeasance. All of these businesses were reported to be damaged in the blast (here). In addition to Coomer's lawsuit, Dominion is threatening legal action against Sidney Powell, who has been among the loudest voices pushing conspiracy theories on behalf of the Trump campaign. "Dominion and AT&T have both called on the media and the public to reject the baseless rumors circulating on social media, which suggest without evidence that there was some election-related connection to the Nashville explosion," a spokesperson for Dominion told USA TODAY. Immediately, Coomer knew things would blow up. Some of that money was spent on tabulators with wireless modems. Reuters found no evidence that Cerberus Capital Management (www.cerberus.com/) owns Dominion. Jim Greer, a spokesperson for AT&T,also told USA TODAY the claims are "not true.". AT&T had a contract to conduct a forensic audit of Dominion Voting Systems in Nashville just prior to a December 2020 explosion in that city. The same Facebook post also said Dominion voting machines were being audited in the AT&T building that was destroyed by a bomb in Nashville. The question is.. the post reads. There is no evidence that the New York printing company whose building burnt down on Christmas Day was under investigation for printing false ballots. The claim: Dominion Voting Systems is tied up in the Nashville bombing, based on the affected AT&T building's ownership and that the cellular company was contracted to audit Dominion's. NBC News reached out to the Department of Homeland Security, which declined to comment on the topic of modem security in voting machine tabulators and scanners. Our fact check work is supported in part by a grant from Facebook. The New York Attorney Generals office said they could not confirm nor deny any investigation. Coomer said in addition to his own information, the personal addresses of everyone from his parents and siblings to his ex-girlfriends have been posted online.