Why Lin Wood’s Georgia Testimony Could Be Bad News For Sidney Powell
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
On Jan. 1, 2021, Lin Wood took to Twitter to reassure the public that he was not insane. “The tweets about my insanity are at an all time high this morning. Wonder why?” Wood wrote. “No worries. I am fine. The attacks do not concern me.”
In the days leading up to the post, Wood mused about the arrest and execution by firing squad of then Vice President Mike Pence as a last-ditch effort to stave off the Electoral College certification of President Joe Biden’s 2020 victory.
The episode was one of several peaks of delusion and desperation for Wood, a die-hard, QAnon-pushing, pro-Trump attorney who for weeks had been hard at work challenging the certification of ballot counts favoring Biden, often in the company of fellow MAGA loyalist attorney and Trump Georgia co-defendant Sidney Powell.
On Wednesday, a filing by Fulton County prosecutors revealed that Wood is expected to be called as a prosecution’s witness in the state’s RICO trial against Trump and 18 other co-defendants over their efforts to meddle with election results in Georgia. The decision by prosecutors to bring in Wood, a loud proponent of conspiracies about the election, and a supporting character in various plots to meddle with election results, as a witness is likely unwelcome news for several of the defendants.
Powell could be in trouble, in particular. Wood told Rolling Stone on Thursday that to his “best recollection” he was asked about her when he testified before the Fulton County grand jury last year, certainly a sign he could be asked about her again once he’s placed on the stand.
In the fallout from Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the election, Wood has largely escaped being sucked into the orbit of the former president’s legal troubles. That’s not to say there haven’t been consequences, including his voluntary retirement to avoid disbarment, penalties in states where he litigated frivolous election challenges, and a defamation case brought by conspiracy influencer QAnon John. Being hauled in to give testimony to the Fulton County grand jury is the closest he’s come to the criminal cases surrounding the 2020 election. “I did not seek advice of counsel during my examination and I certainly did not assert the 5th Amendment,” Wood wrote on Telegram of the testimony he gave last November. “I answered honestly EVERY question posed to me by the prosecutors and members of the grand jury.” He said he testified for “ for 1 1/2 hours.”
Wood made a point to emphasize that while he remained “an unwavering supporter of President Trump,” he had never officially represented him as an attorney and “had no involvement in the issues which to my knowledge and understanding were being investigated by the Special Grand Jury.”
In the immediate aftermath of the election, Wood claimed that Trump had secured more than 70 percent of the vote, and was only thwarted by an international conspiracy of communists and disloyal Republicans. He quickly honed in on election outcomes in swing states, falsely alleging that the number of people who had voted in Michigan was implausibly high, and promoting conspiratorial videos claiming election workers in Cobb County, Georgia, had shredded Trump ballots. And while Wood was not on Trump’s payroll, his involvement in post-election efforts to keep the former president in power, and his frequent crossover with individuals who were working for Trump in an official capacity, likely explains prosecutors’ interest.
In a 2021 interview with CNBC, Wood said that in the immediate aftermath of the 2020 election, his South Carolina plantation became a hub for Trump allies helping to plan efforts to subvert the former president’s election loss. According to Wood, Powell herself had requested the mansion “to do work on the election cases.” General Mike Flynn had arrived shortly after with a gaggle of aides and allies.
“They set up in my living room and one of the sunrooms. They looked like election central. They had computers, whiteboards. They were working,” Wood told CNBC. “I remember making a couple of phone calls to speak to individuals that [Powell] was trying to talk into being plaintiffs, I believe in Georgia,” he added.
Wood told Rolling Stone on Thursday that the grand jury asked him about “Sidney Powell coming to my home in Tomotley, where she worked for a couple weeks with another lawyer or two.” He added that he “was not working” with either Flynn or Powell. “I extended hospitality,” he said, “and I thought they were working on trying to get information about the election.” When asked about making phone calls to potential plaintiffs in Georgia, Wood said was “trying to be helpful,” given that he was from the state and had long practiced in Atlanta.
But Wood was very much involved in the effort to keep Trump in power. He personally filed an election lawsuit in Atlanta against Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger that accused the state of having unconstitutional absentee ballot procedures. As the suit moved through the court, Wood and Powell (who had filed her own lawsuit in Georgia) both appeared at a “Stop the Steel” rally in Alpharetta, Georgia, promoting baseless claims of fraud. Wood’s lawsuit was struck down by a Trump-appointed judge, and the case was dismissed with a rebuke that it had “no basis in fact or in law.”
Wood’s name was also on a lawsuit Powell brought in Michigan. U.S. District Judge Linda V. Parker issued a strong rebuke in her rejection of their request for the decertification of the state’s election results. “This lawsuit seems to be less about achieving the relief plaintiffs seek […] and more about the impact of their allegations on people’s faith in the democratic process and their trust in our government,” Parker wrote.
The Michigan lawsuit would have lasting consequences for Wood. In December 2021 he, Powell, and several other attorneys involved in the suit were ordered to pay $175,000 in legal fees as an “appropriate sanction” for filing a frivolous claim that was “needed to deter Plaintiffs’ counsel and others from engaging in similar misconduct in the future.”
The fallout of the election would also send Wood into a spiral of animosity against prominent allies of the former president. In November 2021, Wood accused Powell and former Trump National Security Adviser Gen. Michael Flynn of being grifters.
“After doing the research and connecting the dots, I have reached the conclusion that the Stop the Steal organization is a Deep State organization to raise money for purposes other than to FIX 2020. … WATCH OUT for anyone affiliated with Stop the Steal. Every lie will be revealed,” Wood wrote on Telegram.
In a recorded conversation with former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne, another Trump loyalist, Wood retroactively accused Powell of having signed his name “to certain lawsuits without my knowledge or permission, and she hasn’t been honest about that.” He made a similar argument in court during Michigan’s disciplinary proceedings against the attorneys involved in the suit. Powell herself acknowledged that it was “certainly possible” there had been a misunderstanding between them.
“I’m not happy about it, I think I was set up by Sidney Powell,” he said to Byrne. Wood told Rolling Stone that he additionally had no involvement with the lawsuits Powell filed in Arizona, and Wisconsin, despite his name being listed in the original complaints. “I had nothing to do substantively with Sidney’s lawsuits in Georgia or in the other places where she filed them and my name appeared … I do not recall agreeing to having my name added to those pleas,” he added.
“I’ve been dragged into litigation and accusations that I’m simply not a part of,” he said.
An attorney for Powell did not respond to a request for comment from Rolling Stone.
Wood’s allegations may not be completely out of character with Powell’s mode of operation. In 2021 a D.C. grand jury found evidence that Powell had falsely listed Wood and businessman Brannon Castleberry as members of the board of her nonprofit, Defending the Republic, in an effort to attract donor interest. According to The Guardian, the grand jury reviewed “extensive documentation” that the men had not agreed to serve on the board, and that one was never even notified of his listed position in the organization.
The spat with Powell was just the beginning of Wood’s bridge-burning. After being fired from the defense team of Kenosha shooter Kyle Rittenhouse, Wood accused former Fox News host Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, Sebastian Gorka, TPUSA’s Charlie Kirk, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and Flynn of being “deep state” operatives involved in a plot to smear his reputation.
Given his history, it’s no wonder Fulton County prosecutors have moved to put Wood on the stand. Still, in a Telegram post written on Wednesday, Wood insisted that there is “NO TRUTH” to accusations that he “flipped” on the former president. Whether that grace extends to Trump’s co-defendants, however, remains to be seen.
More from Rolling Stone
Best of Rolling Stone
