King v. Whitmer CIVIL 20-13134 (E.D. Mich. Aug. 25, 2021) 66 Plaintiffs' attorneys argue that “[t]he court never held an evidentiary hearing in Costantino and, as a result, did not properly assess the merits of the action” and “[t]his was one of the reasons why the[y] presented affidavits from that action in this case.” (ECF No. 161 at Pg ID 5816 n.10.) The point, however, is that presenting those affidavits required counsel to first conduct a reasonable inquiry into the factual allegations contained therein. In their supplemental brief in support of their motion for sanctions, the State Defendants contend that Plaintiffs' counsel failed to engage in the requisite prefiling inquiry, pointing to several statements Powell made in an election-related defamation case, which is based in part on allegations made in the instant lawsuit. (See ECF No. 118-2 at Pg ID 4806.) In a motion to dismiss filed in that case, Powell argued that, even if the plaintiffs “attempt[] to impugn the various declarations as unreliable[] [or] attack the veracity or reliability of the various declarants, ” “[l]awyers involved in fast-moving litigation concerning matters of transcendent public importance, who rely on sworn declarations, are entitled to no less protection” than “[j]ournalists [who] usually repeat statements from sources (usually unsworn, often anonymous) on whom they rely for their stories, and sometimes those statements turn out not to be true.” (Id. at PDF Pg 66-67.) “Journalists”-like attorneys, Powell argued-“must be free to rely on sources they deem to be credible, without being second-guessed by irate public figures who believe that the journalists should have been more skeptical.” (Id. at PDF Pg 67.) In response to the State Defendants' supplemental brief, instead of explaining what efforts they undertook to investigate the veracity of the affidavits, Plaintiffs' attorneys argue that they “never stated that lawyers cannot be held to account.” (ECF No. 120 at Pg ID 5004.) “Instead, ” they argue, the motion to dismiss “justifies lawyers being afforded the same type of Constitutional protections as journalists, ” “who . . . would lose the protection afforded to them by the Supreme Court . . . if they were ‘drawn into long court battles designed to deconstruct the accuracy of sources on which they rely.'” (Id. at ¶ 5004-05 (quoting ECF 118-2 at PDF Pg 66-67).) Attorneys are not journalists. It therefore comes as no surprise that Plaintiffs' attorneys fail to cite a single case suggesting that the two professions share comparable duties and responsibilities. Perhaps this confused understanding as to the job of an attorney, and what the law says about the attendant duties and obligations, is what led Plaintiffs' counsel to simply copy and paste affidavits from prior lawsuits. Perhaps not. But what is certain is that Plaintiffs' counsel will not escape accountability for their failure to conduct due diligence before recycling affidavits from other cases to support their pleadings here. e) Counsel's failure to inquire into Ramsland's outlandish and easily debunked numbers Plaintiffs' counsel attached Ramsland's affidavit to their pleadings to support the assertion that hundreds of thousands of illegal votes were injected into Michigan's election for President. (See ECF No. 6-24.) In his affidavit, Ramsland refers to several statistical “red flag[s], ” including: (i) reports of 6, 000 votes in Antrim County being switched from Former President Trump to President Biden and (ii) 643 precincts in Michigan with voter turn-out exceeding 80% (e.g., 460.51% in Zeeland Charter Township, 215.21% in Grout Township, Gladwin County, and 139.29% in Detroit). (Id. at Pg ID 1573-74 ¶¶ 10, 11.) However, the State issued a bulletin well before this lawsuit was filed explaining the user error that led to the miscount in Antrim County's unofficial results, which had been “quickly identified and corrected.” (ECF No. 39-12.) And official election results for Michigan-reporting voter turnout rates vastly lower than the numbers in Ramsland's affidavit-were published and readily available 35