POLITICS
Rudy Giuliani Found Liable In Defamation Lawsuit Brought By Georgia Election Workers
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A federal judge on Wednesday ruled that Rudy Giuliani is liable for defaming a pair of Georgia election workers, due to the fact the he could not adequately contest the claims in their lawsuit.
Election workers Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, filed a defamation lawsuit against Giuliani over his claims that they had committed fraud during the 2020 presidential election.
“The bottom line is that Giuliani has refused to comply with his discovery obligations and thwarted plaintiffs Ruby Freeman and Wandrea [Shaye] Moss’s procedural rights to obtain any meaningful discovery in this case,” U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell wrote in her 57-page opinion.
“Perhaps he has made the calculation that his overall litigation risks are minimized by not complying with his discovery obligations in this case. Whatever the reason, obligations are case specific and withholding required discovery in this case has consequences,” she wrote.
“Just as taking shortcuts to win an election carries risks — even potential criminal liability — bypassing the discovery process carries serious sanctions, no matter what reservations a noncompliant party may try artificially to preserve for appeal,” she wrote.
Giuliani had argued that the seizure of his electronic devices by the FBI in an unrelated case prevented him from turning over the relevant records. In a filing last month, he conceded that he had made false statements about the women.
Among other claims, Giuliani was accused of saying that the women were “passing around USB ports like they were vials of heroin or cocaine” as part of an election fraud scheme. According to the Jan. 6 committee report, the object was in fact a ginger mint.
Freeman and Moss have said their lives were thrown into turmoil when former President Donald Trump and Giuliani, Trump’s former personal attorney, claimed they committed fraud in the 2020 presidential election.
According to the lawsuit, the wave of hatred unleashed by the defamatory claims compromised Freeman’s safety to the extent that the FBI advised her to leave her home.
Giuliani has already been ordered to pay tens of thousands in attorney’s fees for the plaintiffs, but a trial to determine damages won’t take place until later this year or possibly 2024, Howell said Wednesday.
Giuliani, Trump, and 17 others were indicted in Georgia earlier this month on racketeering charges connected to efforts to overturn the state’s results in the 2020 presidential election. It is the fourth indictment for Trump, who is facing nearly 100 separate criminal charges across all four cases. He has pleaded not guilty to all charges.
TMX contributed to this article.
