{"id":1750902,"date":"2022-11-25T06:13:03","date_gmt":"2022-11-25T11:13:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1750902"},"modified":"2022-11-25T06:48:01","modified_gmt":"2022-11-25T11:48:01","slug":"appeals-court-clears-true-the-vote-leaders-of-contempt","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/appeals-court-clears-true-the-vote-leaders-of-contempt\/","title":{"rendered":"Appeals Court Clears True the Vote Leaders of Contempt"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">18<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fappeals-court-clears-true-the-vote-leaders-of-contempt%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1750902&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>A U.S. appeals court has cleared two <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/t-true-the-vote\">True the Vote<\/a> leaders of contempt, overturning a judge\u2019s order.<\/p>\n<p>U.S. District Judge Kenneth Hoyt ordered Catherine Engelbrecht and Gregg Phillips of True the Vote jailed after he found them in contempt for not fully complying with a\u00a0temporary restraining order that they, in part, reveal the identities of all persons who accessed information from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/t-konnech\">Konnech<\/a>, an election software firm.<\/p>\n<p>Phillips named one of the people but he refused to name another, saying that the latter is an FBI informant.\u00a0Engelbrecht said she thinks she knows who the person is but declined to identify the person.<\/p>\n<p>The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit later <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/court-orders-true-the-vote-leaders-released-from-jail_4846717.html\">ordered the release<\/a> of Engelbrecht and Phillips while declining to immediately rule on the contempt finding.<\/p>\n<p>In <a href=\"https:\/\/www.documentcloud.org\/documents\/23317146-circuit-court-ruling-in-true-the-vote-case\">the Nov. 22 ruling<\/a>, a three-judge panel said\u00a0Hoyt erred when he entered the order.<\/p>\n<p>Demanding the identities \u201cmakes perfect sense when made by a plaintiff in discovery,\u201d the panel said. \u201cBut the record does not reveal what sort of emergency justified the <em>district court\u2019s<\/em> demand for that information <em>before<\/em> the parties could file Rule 12 motions, <em>before<\/em> the defendants could file an answer, <em>before<\/em> the parties could file their initial disclosures, or <em>before<\/em> discovery could begin let alone conclude in the ordinary course.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hoyt also did not explain what emergency justified jailing the defendants for not revealing the identities, the panel said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cRather, the district court made clear that it was imposing its disclosure requirements because it\u2014the district court\u2014wanted to add defendants to the lawsuit.\u00a0That is not how the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure work,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m ordering you right now to give the name to him. I want him in the lawsuit. Whoever it is, I want him in the lawsuit. And I want all of them in the lawsuit,\u201d Hoyt said during one of the hearings.<\/p>\n<p>A party cannot be held in contempt for disobeying an invalid order and\u00a0Hoyt\u2019s order was invalid because it disregarded the normal order of operations imposed by the rules, according to the panel.<\/p>\n<p>The restraining order has since elapsed and been replaced by a preliminary injunction. True the Vote has not yet appealed the injunction, so the panel did not rule on it. But is vacated the contempt order because it was premised on the restraining order. It also remanded the case back to Hoyt \u201cfor further proceedings consistent with the Federal Rules.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The panel consisted of\u00a0Circuit Judges Catharina Haynes, a George W. Bush appointee; Kurt Engelhardt, a Trump appointee; and Andrew Oldham, a Trump appointee.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Fifth Circuit\u2019s powerful ruling lays bare the excesses of Konnech, their attorneys, and the lower court,\u201d True the Vote told The Epoch Times via email. \u201cCatherine and Gregg offer their profound gratitude to the Fifth Circuit\u2019s vindication and are committed more strongly than ever to defending the integrity of American elections.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_4788554\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/Konnech-1200x800-1.jpeg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-4788554\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"lazy size-large wp-image-4788554\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/assets\/themes\/eet\/images\/white.png\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/Konnech-1200x800-1.jpeg\" alt=\"Konnech\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\"><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-4788554\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/Konnech-1200x800-1.jpeg\" alt=\"Konnech\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" \/><\/noscript><\/figcaption><\/a> The office of Konnech Corporation in Okemos, Mich., near Lansing, on Oct. 8, 2022. (Steven Kovac\/Epoch Times)<\/figure>\n<h2>Writ<\/h2>\n<p>In their <a href=\"https:\/\/www.documentcloud.org\/documents\/23317161-true-the-vote-writ\">request for a ruling<\/a>, or writ of mandamus, Engelbrecht and Phillips said Hoyt erred because he entered the restraining order without any evidence from Konnech, which sued True the Vote and the leaders for defamation, and without allowing defendants to put forth all relevant evidence.<\/p>\n<p>The order stemmed from Phillips viewing data believed to be from Konnech in a hotel room in 2021. Phillips has claimed that Mike Hasson, another FBI informant, obtained the data from servers in China.<\/p>\n<p>Defendants said they fully complied with the order except for withholding the name of the second informant, who was never alleged to have accessed any of Konnech\u2019s computers and who Phillips has said would be endangered by having their name made public.<\/p>\n<h2>Opposition<\/h2>\n<p>Konnech opposed both the release of the defendants from jail and the vacating of the contempt order.<\/p>\n<p>Lawyers for the firm said that defendants \u201chave no one but themselves to blame for their confinement\u201d and that they could immediately free themselves if they supplied the identity they were withholding.<\/p>\n<p>In its\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.documentcloud.org\/documents\/23317165-konnech-opposition-to-writ\">opposition to the writ<\/a>, Konnech added that Hoyt \u201ccorrectly exercised his coercive contempt power and should be permitted to continue to use the coercive and compensatory contempt tools available to all federal judges to enforce his orders.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Konnech also said that True the Vote leaders have shown no evidence that the person who is not being identified is an FBI informant and \u201chave presented no evidence and cited no authority to warrant their refusal to disclose the individual\u2019s identity.\u201d The firm\u2019s lawyers also noted that a lawyer for the defendants said during a hearing that the FBI was not interested in shielding the information.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAt bottom, the third person\u2019s identity is needed to discover the truth about what really happened and remedy the situation,\u201d the firm claimed.<\/p>\n<div class=\"author_wrapper\">\n<div class=\"one_author_block round\">\n<div class=\"top_row\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theepochtimes.com\/author-zachary-stieber\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/WEB_ZacharyStieber-1.jpg\" alt=\"Zachary Stieber\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Follow<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Zachary Stieber covers U.S. and world news for The Epoch Times. He is based in Maryland.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A U.S. appeals court has cleared two True the Vote leaders of contempt, overturning a judge\u2019s order.U.S. District Judge Kenneth Hoyt ordered Catherine Engelbrecht and Gregg Phillips of True the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1696392,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[547],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1750902","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-bongino-report"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1750902","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1750902"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1750902\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1696392"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1750902"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1750902"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1750902"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}