MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Attorneys who’ve been defending MyPillow chief executive and election denier Mike Lindell against defamation lawsuits by voting machine companies are seeking court permission to quit, saying he owes them unspecified millions of dollars and can’t pay the millions more that he’ll owe in legal expenses going forward.
Lindell confirmed in an interview with The Associated Press on Friday that he’s out of money and said he understands his lawyers are people who need to make a living.
Attorney Andrew Parker wrote in documents filed in federal court on Thursday that his firm and a second firm representing MyPillow in lawsuits by Smartmatic and Dominion Voting Systems can’t afford what it would cost to represent Lindell and MyPillow through the rest of the litigation. Continuing to defend him would put the firms “in serious financial risk,” he wrote.
It’s the latest in a string of legal and financial setbacks for Lindell, who propagates former President Donald Trump’s lies that the 2020 election was stolen from him, in part by rigged voting machine systems. Several big-box retailers, including Walmart, have discontinued his products.
Maybe some day these lawyers will learn to ask for payment in advance
Or, hear me out as this is probably a crazy idea, not take cases from a crazy cocaine-fueled pillow salesman.
Everyone had a right to fair, good legal counsel. There’s just no reason that these lawyers should still be expecting to actually be paid after their efforts
This is a civil case. You actually don’t have a right to legal counsel, at least in the US, in civil court. An attorney is not going to get appointed to you if you cannot afford one.
Which is probably a profound injustice, but it is reality. Underdogs get ground to dust because they cannot afford lawyers in places like family/traffic court every day. Violations they cannot possible take legal actions to redress are going on all the time. Because there’s no right to an attorney in civil court.
No one is being forced to advocate for or represent this man and frankly, no one should advocate for or represent this man. At least not on his terms. If you chose to take on Mike Lindell as a client, knowing what everyone knows of the kind of defense he is going to demand you proffer, you deserve whatever happens, including not getting paid.
I don’t deny that, but on the flipside lawyers are required to take a client (outside of a public defender). They can literally just say “no” and move on with their day.