Donald Trump’s former lawyer and ex-mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani declared personal bankruptcy on Thursday, December 21 before a city court, after being ordered last week to pay $148 million to two assessors elections in Georgia that he had defamed.
The septuagenarian, spearhead of the former Republican president’s campaign for the invalidation of the results of the 2020 election, filed a request in Manhattan federal court under the famous chapter 11 of the bankruptcy law, declaring $500 million in debt and $10 million in assets, according to court documents.
Last Friday, a jury in a federal court in the capital, Washington, ordered Rudy Giuliani to pay $148 million in compensation and moral damages to Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandr Shaye Moss, two electoral agents in the state of Georgia (South-East) during the presidential election of November 2020. The election was won by Democrat Joe Biden but former Republican President Donald Trump (2017-2021), who dreams of return to the White House, has believed for more than three years that the victory was stolen from him.
Among the creditors listed by Mr. Giuliani in his personal bankruptcy filing are the federal and New York state tax departments for millions of dollars in accumulated debts, as well as law firms, a electronic voting machines (Dominion) and a company of President Biden’s son, Hunter Biden.
“Giuliani’s lies”
The complainant, Mme Moss, had described the years “devastating” lived with his mother due to “Rudy Giuliani lies”, the former personal lawyer and very close to Donald Trump. From a video showing the mother and her daughter passing an object – which turned out to be a mint tablet – during the counting of the ballots, the former mayor and ex-prosecutor of New York claimed that they exchanged a USB key “as if they were doses of heroin or cocaine” to fake the results.
The two black women had recounted how these accusations, taken up by Donald Trump on social networks, had earned them a flood of insults and threats, often of a racist nature. After recognizing in July the falsity of his accusations, Mr. Giuliani said last Friday “have no doubt that his statements were tenable at the time and still are today”but said he was prevented from providing proof.
The old “mayor of America”, recognized worldwide more than twenty years ago for his management of the September 11, 2001 attacks and his role as a former anti-mafia prosecutor in New York, has since fallen into disgrace. He described the claimed amount of $148 million as“absurdity”.
Criminally charged
Rudy Giuliani is also being sued by the law firm that represented him for several years (Davidoff Hutcher & Citron) and which is claiming $1.36 million in unpaid debts. He is also being sued in civil court by the companies Dominion, Smartmatic and by Hunter Biden for amounts “undetermined”according to court documents.
Rudy Giuliani was criminally indicted in August by the Georgia courts along with Donald Trump and seventeen other people for illicit manipulation to reverse the results of the 2020 election in this key state.
Four of the nineteen defendants initially targeted by the indictment issued on August 14, notably under a law on organized crime, have already pleaded guilty. They were sentenced to reduced sentences, without prison time, in exchange for their testimony at the future trial of the other defendants.