Newsmax has denied that it intentionally destroyed internal emails related to its ongoing defamation case filed by election machine company Smartmatic over the network’s claims the company was involved in changing the results of the 2020 election.
Lawyers for the company claim the conservative cable news outlet “concealed over 200,000 documents” and “made multiple material misrepresentations to the court,” by claiming it had given the election machine company all potential evidence.
“Repeatedly, Newsmax has kept documents showing its actual malice and bad motive out of Smartmatic’s hands,” Smartmatic wrote in a court filing. “These were not isolated mistakes. This was by design. Newsmax has intentionally destroyed and concealed crucial evidence that is damaging to its case.”
Newsmax, however, denied the claims, saying Smartmatic’s issues are with copies of emails already in its possession, adding that the filing was “an attempt to manufacture an issue where none exists.”
“Many of the documents Smartmatic claims were ‘newly produced’ and bear on ‘key issues’ were already in Smartmatic’s possession in duplicate or near duplicate versions having been produced by Newsmax,” the network retorted.
Newsmax added that it moved to a different legal team in January and rectified any potential errors as soon as they were discovered.
Smartmatic is suing the cable news channel for false claims made by hosts and guests on its airwaves in the days following the 2020 presidential election, won by Joe Biden (D). After threats of a lawsuit, Newsmax publicly stated on the air that there was no evidence that neither Smartmatic nor Dominion Voting Systems — which famously settled a similar case against Fox News for $787.5 million — had “manipulated votes in the 2020 election.”
