16 States Caught Rigging Election with George Soros Voting Equipment-Truth! & Fiction!
Summary of eRumor:
Sixteen states have rigged the upcoming election with voting equipment manufactured by Smartmatic, a company tied to billionaire Hillary Clinton supporter George Soros.
The Truth:
Mark Malloch-Brown, the chairman of Smartmatic, is indeed tied to George Soros — but Smartmatic election equipment won’t be used in the 2016 presidential election.
Rumors that Soros, a backer of Hillary Clinton and liberal causes around the world, had “rigged” the election in 16 states went viral as Donald Trump ramped up “rigged election” claims in mid-October.
The rumor appears to have first appeared at Web Daily on October 16th. It quickly spread across right-wing websites, eventually landing at the Daily Caller.
The claim has slowly morphed, but one popular version begins:
Hillary is rigging the election!
Surprised? You shouldn’t be.
We’ve just learned that Hillary is tied to the one company that has the power to sway this entire election –Smartmatic.
Smartmatic manufactures the voting machines that will be used this November.
The Chairman of Smartmatic, Mark Malloch-Brown, is on the board of George Soros’ Open Society Foundation.
Yes, George Soros, the billionaire CROOK who is one of Hillary’s biggest donors.
The post goes on to claim that Smartmatic voting equipment will be used to rig elections in 16 states in Clinton’s favor: Arizona, California, Colorado, District of Columbia, Florida, Illinois, Louisiana, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, Nevada, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin.
The first part of the rumor, that Malloch-Brown is connected to Soros, is true. The second part, that 16 states are using Smartmatic voting equipment, is false.
Malloch-Brown is listed as the chairman of Smartmatic, a London-based manufacturer of voting equipment, on the company’s website. Malloch-Brown’s bio states that he formerly served as vice president of Soros’ hedge funds and the billionaire’s Open Society Institute:
Other positions have included vice-chairman of George Soros’s Investment Funds, as well as his Open Society Institute, a Vice-President at the World Bank and the lead international partner at Sawyer Miller, a political consulting firm. He also has served as Vice-Chairman of the World Economic Forum. He began his career as a journalist at The Economist.
Smartmatic states on its website that it acquired Sequoia Voting Systems and “tripled” the company’s market share in the U.S. in less than a year. Sequoia manufactured the Dominion AVC Edge voting machine — which is listed as an approved voting device in scattered counties around the nation.
However, those voting machines were purchased before Smartmatic acquired Sequoia Voting Systems. For its part, Smartmatic responded to controversy of the so-called rigged election by clarifying in a statement that none of its election technology will be deployed in the 2016 U.S. election and that it had no ties to Soros:
Smartmatic is 100% privately owned. Smartmatic has no ties to political parties or groups in any country and abides by a stringent code of ethics that forbids the company to ever donate to any political campaigns of any kind.
The company’s headquarters were based in Florida for many years, but have since moved to London to service its global client base.
George Soros does not have and has never had any ownership stake in Smartmatic.
Rumors 16 states being caught “rigging” the election are based on the fact that Smartmatic acquired Sequoia Voting Systems, which had previously supplied voting machines to various counties in the U.S.
Dominion or Sequoia voting machines could be used at polling locations in some of the 16 states listed in the rumor — but not in others. Arizona lists Sequoia voting equipment being used in one county. Illinois, Michigan and Missouri do not list voting equipment made by Sequoia or Dominion on their official sites. Other states list Dominion voting machines being used in some areas, but not exclusively.
In conclusion, it’s true that Smartmatic’s chairman has connections to Soros. But no proof has been provided that Soros himself is involved with Smartmatic, or that the company’s voting machines are being used to rig the election in 16 states.
This story was updated after Smartmatic released a statement.