Fox’s Mark Levin denies his past promotion of Sidney Powell’s Dominion conspiracy theories

Days after the 2020 election, Levin hosted Powell for a radio interview focused on attacking Dominion

Written by Brendan Karet

Published

On the February 28 edition of his Westwood One radio show, Fox host Mark Levin took issue with a Washington Post article about Dominion Voting Systems’ ongoing lawsuit against Fox News and repeatedly downplayed and dismissed his own role in promoting Sidney Powell’s outlandish conspiracy theories regarding Dominion Voting Systems.

The Post’s article, titled “Rupert Murdoch’s big admission about Fox News,” detailed new revelations from Dominion’s recently publicized court filings against the network for spreading “claims that Dominion, specifically, took part in stealing the election” in 2020. The piece noted that Powell “spouted the claim repeatedly — on Bartiromo’s, Dobbs’s, Pirro’s and Mark Levin’s shows.” (The article was later updated to clarify that Powell’s claims came on Levin’s radio show, not his Fox program.)

Levin asked “what claim” he had allowed Powell to promote on his radio show, specifically regarding “the credibility of the [Dominion] voting machines,” and declared “Sidney Powell promoted whatever she promoted, and the fact is when she took a left turn on this stuff, I cut her off.” Levin additionally defended his attacks on the 2020 presidential election, arguing, “My focus throughout was the Constitution. My focus throughout was what was going on in Pennsylvania. Wasn't about ballots, wasn't about machines, wasn't about any of that stuff. And it remains that.”

Levin 2.28.23 Powell Dominion

Levin 2.28.23 Powell Dominion

From the February 28, 2023, edition of Westwood One's The Mark Levin Show

MARK LEVIN (HOST): Now, I speak for myself here, again. I don't speak for any of the companies I work for or with ever, actually. Nobody contacts me and tells me what to say or what not to say.

There was a piece in the Washington compost this morning by Aaron Blake. Aaron Blake in my view is a fraud and a phony. I guess that's why he works for the Washington compost. And in this piece entitled “Rupert Murdoch's big admission about Fox News” — now, I'm not gonna go into all this.

But I explained to you the other day, when an individual or a company or a group is involved in litigation, lawyers rightly tell the individual, the business, or the group don't speak publicly or don't speak to the press or whatever.

That's what they would say. That's what they do say. Why? They say that because you speak in a courtroom. That's the goal, to speak in a courtroom. So, lawyers on behalf of their parties, they file stuff. They file stuff that looks in the best — puts their clients in the best light and their opponents in the worst light. So they file, there's a response, there's a response to the filing depending on what level the litigation’s in. This is in criminal and civil court. There are motions, filings, there's just all kinds of stuff.

Now, The Washington Post knows this. It's been sued. All the news groups know this. They're fully aware of it. But in the case of Aaron Blake, earlier today, he wrote this: “Sidney Powell spouted the claim repeatedly — on Bartiromo's, Dobbs's, and Mark Levin's shows.” What claim? What claim? About the credibility of the voting machines, her non-credibility. And I read that earlier today, and I said, I never discussed that with Sidney Powell on Fox. The last time I had her on, and we looked, was in 2019, well before the election.

So apparently, he puts in a update at the bottom of the article mentioning, oh, that I had interviewed Sidney Power on radio. Well, that's true. But Sidney Powell promoted whatever she promoted, and the fact is when she took a left turn on this stuff, I cut her off. Remember that, mister producer? So even when referencing the radio, he doesn't get it right.

Now here's the thing that none of them are reporting. Not one of them. Not NBC. Excuse me. Not Washington Post, not Mediaite, none of them — it was the Democrats who were questioning machine voting, including this company, prior to the election.

NBC News did a whole segment on it. There was some expert at one of the universities who did a whole study. You had Democrats in Congress, I believe Elizabeth Warren was one of them — I can go back and check — who said she didn't trust the machines. And it goes on and on and on. Said media outlets, you had a college or colleges and universities. You had so-called experts and Democrats questioning machines. How come none of them have been sued, mister producer? How come none of them have been sued?

If I'm a lawyer, and I am, why wouldn't I sue them all on behalf of my client? It's just a question I have. My focus throughout was the Constitution. My focus throughout was what was going on in Pennsylvania. Wasn't about ballots, wasn't about machines, wasn't about any of that stuff. And it remains that.

A review of Levin’s November 16, 2020, radio broadcast contradicts this version of events. In segments prior to his interview with Powell, Levin repeatedly attacked Dominion as well as critics of the conspiracy theories surrounding them.

In his interview with Powell, Levin specifically directed her to “focus … on the Dominion voting machines,” asked “why are the media ignoring the Dominion voting machines,” and allowed Powell to claim Dominion will “blow up the whole election.” Levin subsequently attacked people who claimed they are “nuts” with “conspiracy theories,” and argued that their critics “don't study this stuff. They haven't looked into this stuff. It's not their name under penalty of perjury.”

Levin 11.16.20 part 4

Levin 11.16.20 part 4

From the November 16, 2020, edition of Westwood One's The Mark Levin Show

MARK LEVIN (HOST): Well, as I have my friend, Sidney Powell here, I'm seeing my friends at Fox with a chyron, “experts deny voting fraud with Dominion voting machines." Now, Sidney Powell, I played for seven minutes at the top of this hour the piece done by PBS on October 26, 2020 — before the election — where there were experts, security experts that were extremely concerned about this voting system. They can call it fraud. They can call it whatever they want. And it's — “Mark, she's gone. We have to get her back." That was just whispered in my ear. OK? Well, let's try and get her back.

Anyway, let me get back to my point. My point is that you have the you have the media out there, friend and foe, that are just blowing off this Dominion voting issue and they haven't even looked into it. I mean, PBS looked into it on October 26. I played that for you. Alright, let's hope we're back. Sidney Powell, how are you?

SIDNEY POWELL: It was an army of information coming in from patriotic Americans who are fed up with the corruption all over, including with the new CIA and FBI and DOJ and —

LEVIN: Alright, I want to focus, though. I want to focus though on the Dominion voting machines. Where now we're having people say, experts say that the Dominion voting machines, there's no fraud. And I played a piece at the top of the hour with PBS, October 26, when they did 7 minutes of how this system can be penetrated, but even more than that, how the system is imperfect and they slapped something on the end of September to try and improve it. Why are the media ignoring the Dominion voting machines, or the system?

POWELL: Because it's going to blow up the whole election. It's going to blow up local elections. It's going to blow up congressional elections for some people because they can pick and choose who they want to win. I've got a first-hand witness mail. In fact, I just emailed you an affidavit from a witness that can now be used publicly. It's redacted in some places, but he was present for the creation of the system for the specific purpose of falsifying election results for [Venezuelan leader] Hugo Chavez and then [Nicolás] Maduro, they exported it all over Latin America. It's the Smartmatic and Dominion system specifically built for doing this very thing, for changing the results of elections.

He saw it done. He knows exactly how they do it. He explained how they do it. He's seen it work. And he realized when things were happening the way they were here, particularly when the states had suddenly went down. You know, they stopped counting the votes. That it's because the lead was so great for President Trump that they had to go in and do a separate reset on the machines to make it come out for Biden.

LEVIN: And you have evidence to this effect, witnesses to this effect? 

POWELL: I do indeed.

LEVIN: Alright.

POWELL: Here's a quote. “The fact that the voting machine displays the voting result that the voter intends and then prints out a paper ballot which reflects that change does not matter. It is the software that counts the digitized vote and reports the results. The software itself is the one that changes the information electronically to the result that the operator of the software and vote counting system intends to produce that counts. That's how it's done. So the software, the software itself configures the vote and voting result changing the selection made by the voter. The software decides the result regardless of what the voter votes."

LEVIN: It's shocking. And this system is in how many states, do you know?

...

LEVIN: This Dominion voting machine, I mean, PBS raised concerns about it October 26. I don't know of another news group out there that's since the election — I mean, PBS was raising concerns about this on so much smaller scale when they were basically just doing testing and so forth. And these security experts came in and said this is a very problematic system. And Georgia just adopted it this year, and then they had to put a patch on the system because they were having problems with the system. And it's as if it's all of a sudden perfect with tens of millions of people using it.

POWELL: That patch, Mark, was probably the change in the software needed to make sure that Biden won.

LEVIN: Uh-huh. And people are going to listen to this. You know, the beautiful people are going to say, “You know, Sidney, you and Mark are nuts with your conspiracy theories and so forth." And you know what? They don't study this stuff. They haven't looked into this stuff. It's not their name under penalty of perjury.

...

LEVIN: What's going on here is shocking. I think this really does look at the dark underbelly of the system, particularly these Democrats' strongholds, machines, cities and states. You can see also, Sidney Powell, we have Republicans that are going along. You can see what's going on in Georgia, which is a disgrace —

POWELL: Oh, yeah. The Georgia system was rushed in at the last minute, and I have had a lawyer tell me that he has a client who knows that there were essentially Biden-type payoffs to family members of the secretary of state and the governor —

LEVIN: Alright, you know, you're making allegations — to protect the company here, I can't prove or disprove what you're saying. You're saying that.

POWELL: Right. I'm saying a lawyer told me that. The lawyer has a client who told me that.

LEVIN: OK. Alright. But I'm just saying I have no independent knowledge of this.

POWELL: Right. Yes. We would have not confirmed that yet either.

LEVIN: Alright. Well, I think the the the core issue here, which is that this Dominion company, they're not the only one that has had problems in the past, and some of these states and counties went ahead and bought their systems. It's a Canadian company. And bought their systems despite the fact that they had some serious issues and I mean, amazingly, PBS pointed it out on October 26, three weeks ago, and now everybody is silent except you and the campaign. It's really a disgusting thing. Alright, my friend. We're going to keep monitoring this, and I want to thank you. I know you're doing a lot of heavy lifting. I want to thank you very, very much.

Levin’s claim that he cut Powell off when “she took a left turn on this stuff” does not accurately characterize their conversation. After allowing Powell to relentlessly attack the credibility of Dominion Voting Systems for over 12 minutes, Levin confronted Powell only when she claimed “there were essentially Biden-type payoffs to family members of the secretary of state and the governor” in Georgia, and cautioned his listeners that “you're making allegations — to protect the company here, I can't prove or disprove what you're saying. You're saying that.” Levin concluded the interview by congratulating Powell and thanking her “very, very much” for her “heavy lifting” on voter fraud claims.

Additionally, Levin’s 2023 claims that he does not “speak for any of the companies I work for or with ever, actually. Nobody contacts me and tells me what to say or what not to say,” runs against his advice in a segment following his interview with Powell in 2020, where Levin declared that “not a single one of these commentators on any of the cable shows, even my colleagues on my favorite cable channel should be free to comment on fraud and what's taking place in these states and cities if they haven't even looked into it.”

Levin has a long track record of casting doubt on the 2020 election result — he recently claimed, “When I hear that you don't have any evidence of fraud, I say to myself, that's the evidence of fraud.”