Georgia 2020 election workers urge judge to hold Giuliani in contempt

By Luc Cohen

NEW YORK (Reuters) -A lawyer for two Georgia election workers that Rudy Giuliani falsely accused of trying to help steal the 2020 U.S. presidential election for Democrat Joe Biden on Friday urged a Manhattan federal judge to hold former the New York City mayor in civil contempt.

The lawyer, Aaron Nathan, said Giuliani – a former personal lawyer to Republican President-elect Donald Trump – had stonewalled their requests for information in a case over how he will pay a $148 million defamation award. 

“He willfully refused to search for and produce documents that would have been responsive to the plaintiffs’ request for production,” Nathan told U.S. District Judge Lewis (JO:) Liman at a hearing in Manhattan federal court.

The election workers, Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea Moss, sued Giuliani in 2021, accusing him of destroying their reputations. Giuliani made repeated false claims that a surveillance video showed the pair concealing and counting suitcases filled with illegal ballots at a basketball arena in Atlanta that was used to process votes during the 2020 election.

Two years later, Giuliani conceded he made defamatory statements about them, and a judge ruled he was liable for defamation as a sanction against him for failing to turn over electronic records to Moss and Freeman.

A Washington, D.C., jury later ordered he pay Freeman and Moss roughly $73 million in compensation and $75 million as punishment.

Nathan told Liman that Giuliani had failed to send them documents that would have helped them determine whether he must turn over a Palm Beach, Florida, condominium he owns.

Giuliani, 80, has claimed that his day-to-day life has been upended by the two election workers, making it difficult to obtain necessary paperwork, and that he has not “willfully disobeyed” any court orders.

He has also said he relied on his previous lawyers in the case to comply with information requests from Freeman and Moss.

Those lawyers, Kenneth Caruso and David Labkowski, withdrew in November, saying it was in part because Giuliani refused to comply with those requests.

Giuliani’s new lawyer, Joseph Cammarata, said in a Dec. 19 filing that the case had devolved into politics.

“This case is not really about the judgment,” Cammarata wrote. “This is a battle between the left and the right.” 

Cammarata was due to address Liman later on Friday.

Freeman and Moss’ lawyers also argue Giuliani should be held in contempt for not complying with Liman’s orders to give up his Manhattan apartment, title to a 1980 Mercedes and sports memorabilia. 

They have urged Liman to hold him in contempt and punish him by finding he did not treat the Palm Beach condominium as his permanent residence, meaning it could be turned over. 

A contempt citation in the district where he had been the top federal prosecutor would mark a further fall from grace for Giuliani, once known as “America’s Mayor” for his response to the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. 

Giuliani has been disbarred for making false claims about the 2020 election, and pleaded not guilty to criminal charges in Georgia and Arizona that he aided Trump’s failed attempt to overturn his loss.