Former Mayor of New York Rudy Giuliani arrives at the federal courthouse in Washington, Wednesday, Dec. 13, 2023 (AP Photo/Jose Luis Magana).
A federal judge in Washington, D.C., has ordered Rudy Giuliani to appear for an in-person hearing next month after the two Georgia election workers he defamed requested he be held in contempt of court for allegedly repeating the lies about the 2020 election that resulted in a $148 million judgment against the former New York City mayor.
The motion for civil contempt was filed Wednesday morning after Giuliani made several pleas last week for public donations, saying he couldn’t afford to feed himself as a result of debt he owes to Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss.
On Wednesday, U.S. District Court Judge Beryl A. Howell ordered Giuliani to respond to the plaintiffs’ filing by Dec. 2 and appear for an in-person hearing to address the matter on Dec. 12.
According to Freeman and Moss, Giuliani’s defamatory campaign against them continued even after they were awarded the astronomical judgment and Giuliani was forced to declare bankruptcy. To curb Giuliani’s behavior and prevent additional legal action, he eventually consented to a permanent injunction prohibiting him from making any additional claims or statements indicating that the plaintiffs had “engaged in wrong-doing in connection with the 2020 presidential election.”
But the former U.S. Attorney in Manhattan has been “brazenly violating that consent injunction,” plaintiffs’ attorneys say. According to the filing (emphasis in original):
In two recent broadcasts of his nightly show, Mr. Giuliani claimed—unambiguously referring to Plaintiffs—that “they never let me show the tapes that show them quadruple counting the the the ballots,” that his tapes showed Plaintiffs “passing these little uh little hard drives that we maintain were used to fix the machines right and they say it was candy. Well you look at it looks like a hard drive to me and they told me it was a hard drive and there’s no proof that it was candy,” and that “you can see if you want uh in living color her quadruple counting votes and the people uh thrown out of the Arena.” These statements repeat the exact same lies for which Mr. Giuliani has already been held liable, and which he agreed to be bound by court order to stop repeating. They constitute unambiguous violations of the Consent Injunction.
Giuliani’s latest statements about Moss and Freeman “merely regurgitate the exact same lies that Giuliani has been spreading for years” which he explicitly agreed not to repeat, the motion says. Evidence that he violated the court’s injunction is “not just ‘clear and convincing,’ it is overwhelming,” the plaintiffs’ attorney wrote.
In the response due by Dec. 2, Howell ordered Giuliani to address why the motion for contempt should not be granted “given the statements attributed to defendant on November 12 and 14, 2024 during two episodes of his livestream program.” Additionally, Giuliani will be required to recommend “appropriate sanction to coerce defendant’s compliance” with the injunction against continuing to defame Moss and Freeman.
Should Giuliani fail to respond to the motion for contempt, it will be treated as “conceding that motion,” Howell wrote.
Giuliani’s widespread legal troubles have continued to worsen of late. After a federal judge in New York earlier this month shredded the former personal attorney to Donald Trump for his “ridiculous” efforts to keep valuable personal property owed to Freeman and Moss, Giuliani’s attorneys quit without telling him. He has since hired a new attorney in the bankruptcy enforcement case.
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