Defamation of election workers
Former Trump lawyer Giuliani is on trial
December 12, 2023, 7:36 a.m
Listen to article
This audio version was artificially generated. More info | Send feedback
After the 2020 US presidential election, Trump’s lawyer at the time helped fuel the chaos. Former New York Mayor Giuliani is making allegations of election fraud – two election workers are now defending themselves in court. It’s about compensatory damages and pain and suffering of up to $43 million.
A defamation trial has begun against ex-President Donald Trump’s former private lawyer Rudy Giuliani over fraud allegations surrounding the 2020 US presidential election. A jury in the US capital Washington will decide how much damages the former New York mayor must pay to two election workers from the state of Georgia.
Federal judge Beryl Howell had already ruled in August that Giuliani was liable for defamation against Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea Moss. That’s why the civil trial that has now started is only about the amount of the payment that the 79-year-old Giuliani is sentenced to pay. Freeman and Moss are demanding compensation and damages of up to $43 million (around €40 million).
After Trump’s election defeat against Democrat Joe Biden in November 2020, Giuliani was a central figure in the elected incumbent’s attempts to overturn the outcome of the election and thus stay in office. The lawyer made allegations of election fraud that have been widely refuted and also targeted election workers Freeman and Moss, who worked in Fulton County, which includes the metropolis of Atlanta.
“Hateful” threats of violence against Moss
Moss, an African American, later testified as a witness before the parliamentary committee investigating the storming of the Capitol on January 6, 2021. She said she was the target of “hateful” and “racist” threats of violence after false election fraud allegations were made against her. “That turned my life upside down.”
Giuliani now has a number of legal problems. He was charged with Trump in a criminal case in Atlanta on allegations of election manipulation.
Giuliani was once highly respected as mayor of New York; after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, he was even referred to as “America’s mayor.” Giuliani, who was born into an Italian immigrant family in New York’s Brookyln district in 1944, later became Trump’s loyal companion.
In April 2018, Trump hired the former prosecutor as his personal attorney. After the Republican’s defeat in the 2020 presidential election, Giuliani attracted ridicule and malice with a series of bizarre appearances in which he denounced alleged voter fraud. Giuliani hasn’t worked for Trump for quite some time.