Mike Lindell

Michael James Lindell ( lin-DEL; born June 28, 1961), also known as the My Pillow Guy and Mike Pillow, is an American businessman, political activist, and conspiracy theorist. He is the founder and former CEO of My Pillow, a pillow, bedding, and slipper manufacturing company.

Lindell is a prominent supporter of and advisor to U.S. President Donald Trump. After Trump's defeat in the 2020 U.S. presidential election, Lindell played a significant role in supporting and financing Trump's attempts to overturn the election result, and spread disproven conspiracy theories about widespread electoral fraud in that election. He has also promoted unproven medical treatments for COVID-19.

In December 2025, Lindell announced that he would seek the Republican nomination for governor of Minnesota in the 2026 Minnesota gubernatorial election and received public support from Trump. On August 4, 2026, Lindell announced he would step down as MyPillow CEO to shift his focus on his run for Governor; on August 11, 2026, Lindell lost the Republican primary to Lisa Demuth.

Lindell was born on June 28, 1961, in Mankato, Minnesota. He was raised in Chaska and Carver, Minnesota. Lindell says he began to develop a gambling addiction in his teenage years. He attended the University of Minnesota after high school in 1979, but dropped out a few months into his studies. Lindell became addicted to and a frequent user of cocaine in his 20s. This addiction became worse after he switched to crack cocaine in the 1990s. Lindell was also incurring gambling debts. The buildup of his addictions between the 1980s and 1990s led to the foreclosure of his house and his wife filing for divorce. Lindell said that he achieved sobriety through prayer in 2009.

In the 1980s, Lindell launched and operated a number of small businesses, including carpet cleaning, lunch wagons, and a few bars and restaurants in Carver County, Minnesota.

Lindell invented My Pillow, a pillow filled with pieces of shredded foam that interlock, in 2004. Lindell grew the business into a Minnesota manufacturing company.

The Better Business Bureau (BBB) revoked accreditation of My Pillow in 2017, lowering its rating to an F based on a pattern of complaints by consumers. The BBB cited a buy one, get one free offer that became a continuous offer and therefore the normal price of the product, not a sale price or free offer. Lindell said, "Naturally, I am terribly disappointed by the BBB's decision."

Lindell named his son Darren as the company's chief operating officer in 2020, citing his own possible future political ambitions.

Some major retailers stopped carrying My Pillow products in 2021. Lindell suggested this was a result of his claims relating to the 2020 United States presidential election results, although outlets like Kohl's and Bed Bath & Beyond have said it was due to market research and low customer demand. In July 2023, MyPillow had auctioned off equipment and subleased some of their manufacturing space after more retailers, including Walmart and Slumberland Furniture, stopped retailing My Pillow products.

During the early days of My Pillow, Lindell made donations to the Salvation Army and Union Gospel Mission.

Lindell founded the Lindell Foundation, a non-profit organization that assists former addicts in getting treatment and other services. The foundation broadened over time, including cancer victims and veterans in their outreach.

In 2019, Lindell launched the Lindell Recovery Network, which connects addicts with others who have gone through drug addiction and the recovery process, as well as faith-based treatment centers and other recovery organizations.

Lindell met with Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump in August 2016 and became an avid supporter. He called Trump "the most amazing president this country has ever seen in history" after his 2016 election victory. In a speech at Liberty University in August 2019, Lindell said, "When I met with Donald Trump, it felt like a divine appointment, and when I walked out of that office I decided I was going to go all in."

Lindell attended the final presidential debate in Las Vegas on October 19, 2016. He spoke at a Trump campaign rally in Minneapolis on November 6, 2016, and attended the Official Donald Watch Party on November 8. He attended Trump's inauguration and Trump gave him an inauguration lapel pin as a personal gift.

Lindell sat next to Trump at an industry roundtable event at the White House in 2017.

Trump complimented Lindell for his "business acumen" at a rally in Fargo, North Dakota, on June 27, 2018. Lindell spoke at a Trump rally on October 4, 2018, in Rochester, Minnesota. Lindell delivered a speech at the 2019 Conservative Political Action Conference, in which he said that Trump was "the greatest president in history" and had been "chosen by God".

Lindell met with Trump and a Trump staffer to discuss opioid addiction in 2019. Lindell was present when Trump signed a bipartisan bill that addressed the growing opioid crisis and attempted to prevent opioid abuse and deadly overdoses.

After Trump's defeat in the 2020 presidential election, Lindell played a significant role in supporting and financing Trump's attempts to overturn the election result.

Lindell helped sponsor a bus tour that sought to challenge the election results. The two-week tour ended in Washington, D.C., on December 14, 2020; Lindell spoke at five stops. Lindell said that "he did not help finance subsequent trips to promote the Jan. 6 rally," referring to the rally that was followed by the storming of the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob. Lindell attended this rally but did not go to the Capitol. Following the Capitol storming, Lindell was among those who advanced the false conspiracy theory that people associated with antifa were responsible for the attack, saying they had probably "dressed as Trump people". On January 15, 2021, Lindell carried a document into the West Wing of the White House; the document, as seen in an enhanced photo, appeared to refer to martial law, the Insurrection Act, and replacing Gina Haspel with Trump loyalist Kash Patel as the CIA director.

On January 25, 2021, Twitter permanently banned Lindell for perpetuating the unsubstantiated claim that Trump won the 2020 election. A Twitter spokesperson explained that Lindell violated the company's civic integrity policy implemented in September 2020 to fight disinformation. After his personal account was banned, Lindell circumvented the ban by using the corporate My Pillow Twitter account to issue several tweets, including a call for Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey to "be found out" and "put in prison when all is revealed!" Following the tweets, Twitter permanently banned the My Pillow account for violating the platform's ban evasion policy.

Lindell purchased three hours of airtime on One America News Network, which had also been threatened with legal action, to broadcast Absolute Proof, a documentary that makes false claims about the election, on February 5, 2021. OANN broadcast a lengthy disclaimer before the program saying the claims were Lindell's alone but that the 2020 election results "remain disputed and questioned by millions of Americans". YouTube removed the documentary that day for violating its policy against election disinformation. At the 41st Golden Raspberry Awards, which gives awards to the films judged the worst, Absolute Proof won the Golden Raspberry Awards for Worst Picture and Worst Actor for Lindell. On April 20, 2021, Lindell published a second documentary titled Absolute Interference, which also promoted debunked conspiracy theories about the election and criticized the news media and communism.

Lindell promoted a conspiracy theory which falsely claimed that voting machine companies Smartmatic and Dominion conspired with foreign powers to rig voting machines to steal the election from Trump. In January and February 2021, Dominion warned Lindell that they planned to sue him, stating in their letter: "You have positioned yourself as a prominent leader of the ongoing misinformation campaign." (Both Smartmatic and Dominion sent similar letters to others as well.) After Newsmax had broadcast a "clarification" of its false reporting on voting machine fraud in response to a demand letter from Dominion, followed by a defamation suit from a company executive, Lindell appeared on the network on February 2, 2021, in an interview to discuss cancel culture but pivoted to repeating the false claims about rigged voting machines. Network anchor Bob Sellers tried to stop Lindell from making his claims; Sellers then read a disclaimer before walking off the set mid-interview.

Lindell has been married three times. His first marriage ended in divorce after about 20 years, and he has children from this marriage. He married Dallas Yocum in June 2013 and filed for divorce in mid-July 2013 after she left him. Lindell said that they had a prenuptial agreement. Lindell's third marriage to Kendra was made public by Donald Trump at a rally on April 6, 2024.

Lindell is an evangelical Christian and received an honorary Doctor of Business from Liberty University in 2019. In bestowing the honor, Dave Brat, the dean of Liberty University's School of Business, called Lindell "one of the greatest Christian businessmen on the planet." The event featured Lindell's donation of 12,000 pillows which the university's news service said were worth over $600,000 to those in attendance. That same year, Lindell self-published a book, What Are the Odds? From Crack Addict to CEO, in which he recounts his overnight recovery from drug addiction and credits divine intervention for the subsequent launch of his pillow business.