MyPillow evicted from Minnesota warehouse over unpaid rent

A court in Minnesota has ordered MyPillow to vacate its former warehouse.

MyPillow founder Mike Lindell, a prominent election denier, said: told the Associated Press That the eviction is a formality because the landlord wants the property back.

The Minneapolis warehouse is approximately 125,000 square feet and has been leased to Lindell since December 2015. The lease agreement between Lindell and his landlord, First Industrial LP, has been amended twice. According to the eviction complaint, the term was 10 years, seven months, and 20 days, and the monthly rent was $57,794.12.

According to the March 7 complaint, Lindell failed to pay rent for February and March 2024. This is not the first time My Pillow has failed to pay rent more than once in the past 12 months, so according to the rental agreement, the landlord has the right to take back possession of the building if agreed.

As of Wednesday, Lindell had not responded to the eviction complaint and failed to appear at a scheduled hearing, forcing a judge to order the eviction. He acknowledged to The Associated Press that MyPillow owes the Delaware-based company about $217,000 in rent.

Lindell said the company no longer needed the space and removed the assets from the warehouse last June, then subleased it to another company until December. The company pulled out in January, “leaving us all stranded.” My Pillow offered to find another tenant, but the landlord wanted the warehouse back, he told the newswire.

Sarah Philo, an attorney representing First Industrial LP, said My Pillow is “more or less gone, but we want to keep this on the books.” The Star Tribune reported.

Lindell is facing multiple defamation lawsuits from two voting machine companies after spreading lies that the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent and stolen from former President Donald Trump. In February, a federal judge ruled that Trump should pay $5 million in an election data dispute lawsuit.

In July 2023, several major retailers removed MyPillow products from their shelves, and the company began auctioning off equipment such as forklifts and conveyor belts.

Mr. Lindell also had a dispute with Fox News, which stopped airing ads for My Pillow in January. He acknowledged that he owed Fox about $7.8 million, but said the network stopped advertising him because it wanted to silence his campaign claims.