The Long Shadow of the Kraken: Why Dominion's War on Disinformation Is Far From Over

The Unfinished Business of 2020

While the ink has long since dried on the historic $787.5 million settlement between Dominion Voting Systems and Fox News, a far more personal and precarious legal drama continues to unfold in courtrooms across the country. That massive corporate payout, while staggering in its scale, effectively functioned as a cost of doing business—a bitter pill swallowed by a media empire to insulate its shareholders and executives from the unpredictability of a jury trial. However, for the individual architects of the so-called "Big Lie," there is no corporate treasury to hide behind. The legal battles currently consuming figures like Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell represent the unfinished business of 2020, serving as a stress test for the American judicial system: can it effectively penalize political disinformation when the defendant is not a conglomerate, but a private citizen wielding immense public influence?

The case of Rudolph Giuliani offers the starkest example of this new phase in accountability. Once heralded as "America's Mayor," Giuliani found himself liable for a crushing $148 million judgment in the defamation suit brought by Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss. Unlike the Fox settlement, which ended with a wire transfer and a statement, Giuliani’s reckoning has been a slow-motion dismantling of a personal legacy. The sheer magnitude of the damages awarded by the Washington, D.C. jury sends a chillingly unambiguous message: the First Amendment is not a shield for targeted character assassination. This judgment goes beyond mere compensation; it is punitive, designed specifically to deter future political actors from leveraging private citizens as collateral damage in their quest for power. The resulting bankruptcy proceedings have laid bare the financial ruin that awaits those who trade in verifiable falsehoods, stripping away the veneer of untouchability that often surrounds high-level political operatives.

Similarly, Sidney Powell, the attorney who promised to "release the Kraken," finds herself ensnared in a web of legal consequences that prove far more tangible than her mythical sea monster. While she accepted a plea deal in the Georgia racketeering case—agreeing to testify truthfully in exchange for probation—her civil liabilities remain a looming threat. The Dominion lawsuits against Powell and Giuliani are distinct from the Fox case because they target the originators of the narrative, not just the broadcasters. Legal scholars argue that this distinction is vital for the health of the republic. If the law only punishes the megaphone (the media networks) but ignores the speaker (the political operative), the ecosystem of disinformation remains fundamentally intact. The courts are now tasked with establishing the price of a lie when it is told by an officer of the court.

Furthermore, these individual lawsuits are arguably more dangerous to the disinformation ecosystem than the corporate settlements because they attack the credibility of the movement's leaders in a way that a corporate write-off does not. When Fox News settled, many viewers could rationalize it as a strategic business decision. When Giuliani is forced to liquidate assets and Powell is compelled to admit guilt in criminal court, the facade of their "crusade" cracks. We are witnessing a systematic deconstruction of the "Stop the Steal" infrastructure, not through legislation or censorship, but through the rigorous, evidentiary demands of tort law.

The "unfinished business" also extends to the second wave of litigation led by Smartmatic, which is demanding nearly $2.7 billion in damages from Fox News and other outlets. Unlike Dominion, Smartmatic has signaled a greater willingness to take their case to trial, potentially eager to clear its name in a public forum rather than settle quietly. This suggests that 2026 will not be a year of moving on, but rather a year where the American public is forced to relive the minutiae of 2020 through the lens of cross-examination. The persistence of these cases proves that in the American legal system, the statute of limitations on truth is not as short as the political memory. As we look toward the midterm elections, these courtroom dramas serve as a persistent reminder: while political narratives move at the speed of social media, justice moves at the speed of the docket—slow, grinding, and ultimately inescapable.

From 'Release the Kraken' to Bankruptcy Court

The phrase "Release the Kraken," once a bellicose rallying cry echoed in hotel ballrooms and cable news chyrons across America, has curdled into a cautionary tale of legal reckoning that is currently playing out in the sterile, fluorescent-lit confines of bankruptcy courts. While the Fox News settlement was a seismic corporate event—a transaction that, for all its magnitude, was ultimately a balance sheet adjustment for a media empire—the ongoing litigation against the individual architects of the "Big Lie" represents a far more personal and visceral dismantling of political impunity. For figures like Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell, the courtroom has transformed from a stage for political theater into a mechanism of financial existentialism, stripping away the veneer of partisan warriorhood to reveal the stark liabilities of defamation in the American judicial system.

At the heart of this legal saga is the stark contrast between the frenetic energy of late 2020 and the grinding, procedural reality of 2026. Sidney Powell, who famously promised to unleash biblical-scale evidence of voter fraud, now finds herself navigating a labyrinth of sanctions and civil suits that threaten to eclipse her professional legacy. The "Kraken" lawsuits, filed in battleground states like Michigan and Georgia, were not merely dismissed; they were repudiated by judges with a ferocity rarely seen in American jurisprudence. The sanctions handed down—requiring Powell and her legal team to pay the legal fees of the officials they sued—were an initial salvo, a judicial acknowledgment that the court system had been weaponized for performative grievance. However, Dominion’s defamation pursuit goes deeper, piercing the "political opinion" defense to target the factual assertions made by Powell regarding the company's proprietary technology. The legal theory here is precise: while political speech enjoys robust First Amendment protection, specific, verifiable, and false claims about a private company's operations do not.

The trajectory of Rudy Giuliani serves as the grimmest meridian of this accountability. Once "America's Mayor," celebrated for his leadership in the aftermath of 9/11, Giuliani’s descent into bankruptcy is a direct consequence of the defamation ecosystem he helped cultivate. While his $148 million judgment in the case brought by election workers Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss was the precipitating event for his Chapter 11 filing, the pending Dominion lawsuit looms like a second, perhaps final, financial guillotine. Dominion is seeking $1.3 billion in damages from Giuliani, a figure that is effectively symbolic given his current insolvency, yet strategically vital. By forcing these cases through discovery and towards trial, Dominion is ensuring that the factual record is corrected under penalty of perjury. The discovery process has forced the surrender of communications, financial records, and sworn depositions that dismantle the "stolen election" narrative piece by piece, entering them into the historical record not as partisan talking points, but as adjudicated facts.

This phase of the "War on Disinformation" tests the limits of civil liability as a deterrent against political falsehoods. Critics of the litigation argue that bankrupting individuals does little to stem the tide of misinformation in a fragmented media landscape. However, legal scholars point to a shifting calculus for political operatives. The "cost of doing business" for spreading disinformation has historically been zero—or even negative, considering the fundraising boons often associated with viral conspiracy theories. The Dominion strategy flips this economic model. By aggressively pursuing the individuals, not just the platforms, the litigation establishes a precedent that the speaker, not just the megaphone, is liable for the damage caused by the sound. It turns the profitable enterprise of rage-farming into a high-liability gamble, creating a "chilling effect" that constitutional purists debate but corporate risk managers undeniably respect.

The financial devastation wrought by these suits is not incidental; it is central to the plaintiff's argument that lies have a quantifiable market price. When trust in a democratic institution or a voting technology firm is eroded, the damages are calculated in lost contracts, security costs, and diminished valuation. The courts are currently engaged in the complex actuarial science of pricing reputation. For Giuliani and Powell, the "Kraken" has indeed been released, but it is not a mythical beast consuming their enemies. It is the leviathan of the American tort system, slow-moving and insatiable, systematically consuming the assets and reputations of those who tested the boundaries of truth for political gain.

Piercing the Privilege: The Legal Battleground

The settlement check from Fox News—a staggering $787.5 million—may have cleared, signaling a corporate capitulation that reverberated through Wall Street and media boardrooms alike. Yet, for the architects of the narrative that necessitated that payout, the legal nightmare is far from over. While the network opted to cut its losses and pivot, individuals like Rudy Giuliani, Sidney Powell, and Mike Lindell find themselves in a far more precarious position. They are currently navigating a legal minefield where the corporate veil offers no shelter, and where the First Amendment—often the impregnable shield of American political discourse—is facing one of its most rigorous stress tests in modern history. This phase of the litigation, which legal scholars are calling the "Accountability Era," is less about corporate liability and more about piercing the perceived privilege of political operatives who believed their proximity to power granted them immunity from the consequences of verifiable falsehoods.

At the heart of these ongoing battles is a fundamental question that the American legal system has wrestled with since New York Times v. Sullivan established the "actual malice" standard in 1964: At what point does political advocacy become actionable defamation? For Giuliani and Powell, the "Kraken" lawsuits were not merely legal filings; they were performative acts of political theater. However, in the cold light of a courtroom, devoid of television cameras and rallying bases, these performance pieces are being dissected with surgical precision. Dominion Voting Systems, and arguably the broader American public, are seeking to establish a precedent that the First Amendment is not a suicide pact for the truth. The legal strategy employed against these individuals differs significantly from the one used against Fox. With the network, the focus was on the institutional amplification of lies known to be false. With the individuals, the focus is on the creation and persistence of those lies despite direct evidence to the contrary.

The financial stakes for these private citizens are existential. Unlike a media conglomerate that can absorb a billion-dollar hit as a (painful) cost of doing business, the damages sought against Giuliani, Powell, and Lindell threaten total personal ruin. We are witnessing a unique intersection of bankruptcy law and defamation law, as defendants attempt to shield assets or plead insolvency in the face of judgments that could exceed the GDP of small nations. Giuliani’s navigation of bankruptcy courts, claiming a lack of liquidity while facing mounting legal fees, underscores the personal toll of this "lawfare." It sends a chilling message to future political operatives: the cost of peddling disinformation may not just be your reputation, but your entire livelihood.

Furthermore, the "reliance on counsel" defense—the idea that these figures were simply acting on legal theories provided by others—is crumbling under the weight of the Fox discovery documents. Those internal communications revealed that many within the Trump orbit knew the claims were baseless. This strips away the "good faith" argument that is essential for defending against defamation claims involving public figures. The courts are systematically stripping away the layers of protection that usually surround political speech. When a lawyer like Powell claims that "no reasonable person" would have believed her assertions were statements of fact, she is attempting to rewrite the relationship between a political figure and the public trust. The courts, so far, have not been amused by this "Schrödinger's Defamation" defense, where a statement is simultaneously a solemn declaration of election fraud to the base and "mere hyperbole" to the judge.

The Cost of Influence: Financial vs. Reputational Ruin

While the historic $787.5 million settlement paid by Fox News in 2023 was a seismic event in media law, it was, in the cold calculus of Wall Street, a manageable operational expense—roughly equivalent to one quarter of the network's pre-tax profits. The corporation survived, its broadcast license intact, its primetime lineup reshuffled but fundamentally undeterred. However, as the legal focus shifted in 2024 and 2025 toward the individual architects of the "Big Lie"—Rudolph Giuliani, Sidney Powell, and Mike Lindell—the equation changed drastically. For these individuals, the cost of influence was not a line item on a corporate ledger; it was total, existential liquidation.

By early 2026, the distinction between "reputational damage" and "financial ruin" had collapsed entirely for the former President's legal team. The most vivid illustration remains the tragic trajectory of Rudy Giuliani. Once heralded as "America’s Mayor," Giuliani's descent serves as the grim benchmark for defamation consequences. Following the $148 million judgment awarded to Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, Giuliani was forced not merely into bankruptcy, but into a humiliating public auction of his life's accruals. The seizure of his Manhattan apartment, his Palm Beach condo, and even his Yankees World Series rings signaled a new reality: the American legal system creates a "piercing of the veil" that political clout cannot withstand. Unlike a media conglomerate that can insure against defamation, an individual has no shield against a nine-figure verdict.

The financial attrition has proven to be a more effective silencer than any gag order. In the case of Sidney Powell, the "Kraken" lawsuits resulted not in the overturning of an election, but in a deluge of sanctions and legal fees that drained her resources long before a jury could even hear the primary defamation cases. The disciplinary proceedings in Texas, which sought her disbarment, struck at the very asset that made her dangerous: her license to practice law. Without the credentials to file suits, the mechanism for spreading "lawfare" disinformation was dismantled.

Similarly, Mike Lindell, the MyPillow CEO, discovered that ideological fervor does not grant immunity from arbitration awards. The 2024 upholding of the $5 million "Prove Mike Wrong" challenge award against him was a watershed moment, proving that specific, factual claims made in the public sphere—even those framed as promotional stunts—carry binding contractual weight.

However, a complex paradox remains. While the courts have successfully exacted a financial toll, the reputational ruin is viewed through a polarized lens. To the broader legal community and the mainstream public, these figures are pariahs, stripped of credibility and standing. Yet, within the enclosed ecosystem of the far-right, their financial destitution has been reframed as martyrdom. Giuliani's livestreamed appeals for cash and Lindell's telethons suggest that while the legal system can bankrupt a disinformation agent, it cannot force them to recant so long as there is an audience willing to subsidize their defense.

Nevertheless, the chilling effect on the next generation of political operatives is palpable. The "Giuliani Standard"—the absolute destruction of one's legacy and wealth—has introduced a rigorous risk assessment into political consulting. Attorneys are now far less likely to sign their names to frivolous affidavits, knowing that the bar association and the bankruptcy court are watching. The "Big Lie" may still have believers, but the number of professionals willing to sign their names to it in a court of law has plummeted. The war on disinformation is far from over, but the cost of participation has been set at a price few can afford to pay.

Eroding the Bedrock: Impact on US Democracy

The settlement with Fox News may have been the financial earthquake, but the pursuit of individual actors like Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell represents the aftershocks that continue to destabilize the very ground Americans stand on. While the corporate payout was a staggering admission of liability—a $787.5 million calculus of risk management—the individual defamation suits strike at a far more precarious element of our democracy: the personal price of political fabrication. We are witnessing a stress test of the American legal system’s capacity to serve as a bulwark against the weaponization of falsehoods, a test that goes far beyond the balance sheets of a media empire and into the heart of civic trust.

The "Kraken" lawsuits, once touted by Powell as a biblical unleashing of evidence, have fundamentally altered the DNA of American political discourse. They introduced a strategy where the courtroom is not used to seek justice, but to generate content for a feedback loop of grievance. By the time these cases were dismissed or settled, the narrative contagion had already taken hold. The damage to the "bedrock" is measurable and profound. We are no longer debating policy; we are litigating reality itself. The legal system is designed to adjudicate facts, but it is ill-equipped to deprogram a populace that has been fed a steady diet of "alternative facts" for over half a decade. The persistence of these narratives, despite decisive legal rebukes, suggests that the court of public opinion has effectively seceded from the court of law.

This divergence is most starkly visible in the erosion of public confidence in electoral integrity. The "Big Lie" did not die with the certification of the 2020 election; it metastasized into a permanent skepticism that colors every ballot cast from school boards to the Senate. As we navigate the political landscape of 2026, the data paints a grim picture of this cumulative corrosion. Trust is no longer a shared resource but a partisan commodity, hoarded and weaponized. The following projection illustrates the alarming trajectory of voter confidence, a direct downstream effect of the unchecked disinformation campaigns spearheaded by the very figures Dominion continues to pursue.

The sheer scale of the Partisan Gap shown above—now projected to exceed 50 points—indicates a bifurcation of reality that no single verdict can bridge. When Giuliani—formerly "America's Mayor"—faced the complete liquidation of his assets, it was a moment of supreme irony and tragedy. The man who once utilized the RICO act to dismantle the mafia was himself dismantled by the machinery of civil liability. Yet, for his most ardent supporters, his financial ruin was not proof of his deceit, but evidence of his martyrdom. This is the paradox that Dominion’s lawyers are fighting: accountability can inadvertently fuel the very fire it seeks to extinguish.

The Next Chapter: Precedents for 2028

As the dust settles on the immediate aftermath of the 2024 election cycle, legal scholars and political strategists are already turning their gaze toward 2028, analyzing how the "Dominion doctrine"—the emerging body of case law and settlements resulting from the 2020 election fallout—will reshape the next presidential contest. The precedent established here is not merely financial; it is structural. The settlements extracted from major networks and the relentless pursuit of individual actors like Rudy Giuliani and Sidney Powell have effectively commoditized political disinformation, attaching a tangible, potentially bankrupting price tag to the "Big Lie." For decades, the precedent set by New York Times v. Sullivan (1964) provided a nearly impenetrable shield for media organizations and public figures, requiring plaintiffs to prove "actual malice"—that a statement was made with knowledge of its falsity or reckless disregard for the truth. The Dominion litigation did not overturn Sullivan, but it did something perhaps more consequential for the 2028 cycle: it provided a roadmap for how to pierce that shield through aggressive discovery.

The "smoking gun" in these cases was not the falsehood of the claims themselves, which was readily apparent, but the internal communications—the text messages, emails, and producer notes—that revealed a chasm between what was said on air and what was believed in private. This has created a new operational reality for 2028: the era of the "discoverable campaign." Political operatives and media surrogates must now operate under the assumption that their private skepticism could become "Exhibit A" in a billion-dollar defamation suit. The legal battles against Giuliani and Powell, in particular, serve as a stark warning to the "legal architects" of future campaigns. Unlike media networks, which have deep pockets and insurance policies, individual attorneys and surrogates face personal ruin. Giuliani’s bankruptcy proceedings and the stripping of his assets underscore a grim reality for future political warriors: the corporate veil of a campaign or a network offers no protection against individual tort liability when the conduct is deemed egregious.

As we look toward 2028, the question is not whether disinformation will exist, but whether it can be broadcast. The "Dominion Effect" has erected a financial firewall. To breach it, a network or surrogate must be willing to bet their entire existence on a lie. In the ruthless calculus of American politics, that is a wager fewer players are willing to make. The courts have effectively signaled that while the First Amendment protects the right to be wrong, it does not protect the right to knowingly profit from the destruction of a private entity's reputation. This distinction, sharpened on the anvil of the 2020 fallout, will define the boundaries of political warfare for the next decade.