Did the U.S. Army seize vote-count servers in Germany operated by Dominion, the company that provides voting machines to many American states? No, that's not true: There is no sourcing for a tweet cited by U.S. Rep. Louie Gohmert for the claim, which the congressman admits he does not know to be true. Dominion is not affiliated with Scytl, the company cited by Gohmert as owning the German servers. The company said the U.S. military has not seized any of its servers and it is based in Spain, not Germany. No American voting information is housed on its servers outside the United States, the company said.
The claim appeared in an article published by The Geller Report on November 14, 2020, titled "US Army seizes Dominion servers in Germany, Trump lawyer vows, 'I'm going to release the Kraken'" (archived here), which opened:
The evidence for massive voter fraud continues to pile up, and these two new developments could break the whole thing wide open. The Dominion servers may reveal just how extensive the fraud was -- they could be the gamechanger. And Trump lawyer Sidney Powell says it's "irrefutable" that Trump won in a landslide. The media's desperate attempts to discredit all claims of fraud, dismissing them with hasty and shoddy rationalizations, and to shut down all discussion of the matter shows how close the Trump team is to exposing the entire massive enterprise. Freedom, and the future of the nation itself, hang in the balance.
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US Army seizes Dominion servers in Germany, Trump lawyer vows, 'I'm going to release the Kraken' - Geller Report News
Facebook Twitter Google+ The evidence for massive voter fraud continues to pile up, and these two new developments could break the whole thing wide open. The Dominion servers may reveal just how extensive the fraud was -- they could be the gamechanger. And Trump lawyer Sidney Powell says it's "irrefutable" that Trump won in a...
The article sourced the claim about a German server being seized by the American military to this tweet posted on November 13, 2020, by George Papadopoulos, a former foreign policy adviser to Donald Trump who went to prison for lying to the FBI about his contacts with Russians during the 2016 campaign. There is speculation that Papadopoulus is in line for a presidential pardon before Trump leaves office:
Breaking: Congressman Louie Ghomert has stated that The U.S. Army has seized servers for Dominion in Germany.
Breaking: Congressman Louie Ghomert has stated that The U.S. Army has seized servers for Dominion in Germany.
-- George Papadopoulos (@GeorgePapa19) November 14, 2020
Papadopoulos was referring to comments Rep. Gohmert made on a Zoom call broadcast by Newsmax, as related in this tweet:
Louie just said .. The US Army went in and confiscated Scytl's SERVERS !!!
Scytl voting machine is out of Barcelona, Spain
Scytl morphed into Dominion
Louie just said .. The US Army went in and confiscated Scytl's SERVERS !!!
-- Joni Job (@jj_talking) November 12, 2020
Scytl voting machine is out of Barcelona, Spain
Scytl morphed into Dominionhttps://t.co/78y8iSNJtc
Rep. Gohmert, a Texas Republican, said on the Zoom call that on Sunday he was given:
"... information from some of our former intel people that there was extremely compelling evidence that could be gleaned from Scytl, that's a company headquartered in Barcelona, Spain, that was responsible for aggregating all of the information from all the machines and what not. But now the main headquarters had moved to Frankfurt."
Gohmert claimed that he was given more details early Monday, but that the U.S. military had already taken action:
... it turns out, I don't know the truth, I know that there was a German tweet in German saying that on Monday U.S. Army forces went into Scytl and grabbed their server. There are some that believe this is the U.S intelligence that manipulated all this to cover their own rear ends.
Here is the video clip of Rep. Gohmert's comments:
Rep. Gohmert repeated the claim in a Newsmax interview:
Lead Stories found a copy of the German tweet (archived here) that Gohmert appeared to be referencing:
Etwas großes ist im Anmarsch. Die spanishce Softwarefirma Scytl, die weltweit Wahlmanipulationssoftware anbietet, die in den USA eingesetzt waren, ist ins Fadenkreuz geraden.
Die Server fur die Manipulation stand in Germany (Frankfurt). Ein Schelm wer böses dabei denkt. Heute Nacht wurde durch die USA ARMY, mit einem riesigen Aufgebot die Surfer beschlagnahmt.
This is a translation of the German tweet into English:
Something big is coming. The Spanish software company Scytl, which offers election manipulation software worldwide that was used in the USA, is right in the crosshairs.
The server for the manipulation was in Germany (Frankfurt). A rogue who thinks evil about it. Tonight the USA ARMY confiscated the surfers with a huge contingent.
There is no sourcing for this information and no independent confirmation that the claim is real. In fact, Gohmert acknowledged in his interview that "I don't know the truth."
How do we know it could not be true? Scytl, the company in question, released a detailed statement, but it was not accessible online at the time of writing. Lead Stories archived it here.
The company pointed out that it is not headquartered in Germany, no servers have been seized by American military or intelligence, no American vote-counting information is on any servers outside the United States, and it is not affiliated with Dominion.
This is the full statement:
Fact Checking Regarding US Elections: Debunking Fake News
November 13, 2020 | General
Following several erroneous statements that have been published in digital and social media, Scytl would like to clarify the following:
The technologies implemented by Scytl in the US are both hosted and managed within the US, by a local subsidiary, SOE Software, based in Tampa, Florida.
We do not tabulate, tally or count votes in the US
We do not provide voting machines in the US
We did not provide online voting to US jurisdictions for the US elections.
We do not have servers or offices in Frankfurt
The US army has not seized anything from Scytl in Barcelona, Frankfurt or anywhere else
We are not owned by George Soros and have never been connected to him
We are not tied to Smartmatic, SGO, Dominion or Indra
We have no ties with Russia either
For the US General Election, Scytl provided 4 products and services to city, county, and state clients across the United States. Each of these products and services provide information created and approved by each individual client, to voters or temporary election workers.
Election Night Reporting (ENR): ENR is a platform that provides visual representation of votes that have been tabulated by local elections officials. ENR allows elections offices to provide real-time election results to citizens in a multi-lingual, mobile friendly platform. On Election Night, each election office tabulates the vote using their tabulation vendor's physical machines and uploads those results to Scytl's ENR. All Scytl ENR servers being used for the US elections are physically located in the United States. Scytl does NOT tabulate, tally or count any votes.
Online Election Worker Training: Scytl works with elections offices to take their already-created training content and puts it into an online learning management system, increasing information retention, consistency, and the ability to track / report on trainee progress. All of the content for this training is provided and fully approved by each individual client.
Online Voter Education: Our Voter Education Platform is a tool used to create a website for election officials to provide important election information before, during, and after an election. This tool allows voters to look-up where they can vote, the available voting methods, any ID or other requirements needed in order to vote, register to vote, view their sample ballot, and more. All content on these websites is provided and approved by each individual client.
Electronic Ballot Delivery (eBD): Is a platform that allows state election offices to securely deliver ballots to UOCAVA and absentee voters. Each state has different laws and regulations regarding who can request their ballot through this system, and how that ballot can be returned. All servers being used for eBD for the US elections are physically located in the United States. What eBD does NOT do:
Allow voters to vote online
Tabulate, tally, or count votes
NewsGuard, a company that uses trained journalist to rank the reliability of websites, describes gellerreport.com as:
A blog run by activist Pamela Geller that portrays Islam and its adherents in a negative light. The site has published false claims about former U.S. President Barack Obama and the COVID-19 pandemic.
According to NewsGuard the site does not maintain basic standards of accuracy and accountability. Read their full assessment here.
