Smartmatic head charged with bribing Philippine election officials for contracts

The founder of the Smartmatic voting machine company was indicted by a grand jury on Thursday for allegedly conspiring to pay a $1 million bribe to win a contract for the 2016 election in the Philippines.

Venezuelan national Roger Alejandro Pinate Martinez was indicted by a federal grand jury in Florida, where he resides. The indictment accuses him of conspiring to pay a $1 million bribe to secure a contract for the 2016 Philippine election, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of Florida, which has yet to make the indictment publicly available.

Separate from this indictment, Smartmatic claimed it was defamed when it was accused during an on-air broadcast on Fox News of collaborating with Dominion Voting Systems to manipulate the 2020 U.S. presidential election results against former President Donald Trump. In response, Smartmatic filed a $2.7 billion defamation lawsuit against Fox, which is set to go to trial next year. Fox has denied any wrongdoing.

The Justice Department’s statement about the indictment does not mention Smartmatic or the 2020 election.

According to U.S. Attorney Markenzy Lapointe’s office, the alleged bribes were paid to secure and maintain contracts related to providing voting machines and election services for the 2016 Philippine elections and to facilitate the release of payments, including value-added tax refunds.

Two other executives of the company, including a U.S. citizen and a former chairman of the Philippine election commission, have also been charged.

Smartmatic released a statement to X announcing that “two of our employees” have been placed on a leave of absence while noting they “remain innocent until proven guilty.” The company did not name which employees were placed on leave.

“No voter fraud has been alleged and Smartmatic is not indicted,” the election machine company’s statement added. “Voters worldwide must be assured that the elections they participate in are conducted with the utmost integrity and transparency. These are the values that Smartmatic lives by.”

The company is considered one of the largest providers of voting systems in the world and was thrust into the spotlight after the 2020 election amid Trump’s claims about the integrity of the election.

Fox agreed to pay Dominion Voting Systems $787 million last spring to settle a separate defamation lawsuit over claims made on air.