Dominion Voting machines worked ‘beautifully’ in the Sault

Dominion Voting Systems may have lost millions of dollars of business due to misinformation reported by Fox News, but the woman who runs Sault Ste. Marie's municipal elections would be more than happy to use the company's vote-counting machines again on Oct. 26, 2026.

Mayor Matthew Shoemaker and our city council were elected last fall with help from rented Dominion Voting tabulating machines.

It was the Sault's first try at automating the manual counting of paper ballots, and city clerk Rachel Tyczinski would be more than happy to use the company again.

"It worked even better than anticipated," Tyczinski tells SooToday.

"In a new system, we thought there might be a hiccup or two along the way, but the tabulators worked beautifully."

Fox and Dominion Voting Systems reached a $787-million settlement Tuesday in the voting machine company’s defamation lawsuit, averting a trial in a case that exposed how the top-rated network chased viewers by promoting lies about the 2020 presidential election.

“The truth matters. Lies have consequences,” Dominion lawyer Justin Nelson said in a news conference outside the Wilmington, Delaware, courthouse after a judge announced the deal.

Dominion had asked for $1.6 billion, arguing that Fox had damaged its reputation by helping peddle phony conspiracy theories about its equipment switching votes from former President Donald Trump to Democrat Joe Biden.

Fox said the amount greatly overstated the value of the Colorado-based company.

The resolution in Delaware Superior Court follows a recent ruling by Judge Eric Davis in which he allowed the case to go to trial while emphasizing it was “CRYSTAL clear” that none of the allegations about Dominion aired on Fox by Trump allies was true.

In a statement issued shortly after the announcement, Fox News said the network acknowledged "the court’s rulings finding certain claims about Dominion to be false.” It did not respond to an inquiry asking for elaboration.

Records released as part of the lawsuit showed how Fox hosts and executives did not believe the claims by Trump’s allies but aired them anyway, in part to win back viewers who were fleeing the network after it correctly called hotly contested Arizona for Democrat Joe Biden on election night.

The settlement, which does not need the judge's approval, will end a case that has proven a major embarrassment for Fox News.

If the case had gone to trial, it also would have presented one of the sternest tests to a libel standard that has protected media organizations for more than half a century.

Several First Amendment experts had said Dominion’s case was among the strongest they had ever seen.

Still, there was real doubt about whether Dominion would be able to prove to a jury that people in a decision-making capacity at Fox could be held responsible for the network’s airing of the falsehoods.

Dominion accused Fox of defaming it by repeatedly airing, in the weeks after the election, false allegations by Trump allies that the company's machines had flipped votes to Biden – even as many at the network doubted the claims and disparaged those who were making them.

The company sued both Fox News and its parent, Fox Corp., and said its business had been significantly damaged.

Here in the Sault, voters weren't immune to the Fox News allegations against Dominion Voting Systems.

During advance polls and on election day, Tyczinski was taking calls from suspicious citizens at polling stations.

"I needed to allay concerns to say [the tabulators] were not connected to the Internet at all, and that we'd done extensive logic and accuracy testing."

"Elections Ontario used the same machine."

Tyczinski says vote-counting technology is available from other vendors and the city is expected to issue a request for proposals in advance of the Oct. 26, 2026 municipal elections.

"It was so good. Without the human error of hand-counting, we're confident in the result."

"We all could all have gone home by 9:30 p.m. if I had let them tabulate the long-term care votes earlier in the day," Tyczinski said.

- with files from the Associated Press