As Rudy Giuliani’s defamation trial got underway earlier this week, his defense attorney told jurors a brutal verdict would be “the end of Mr. Giuliani,” likening an eight-figure award to a civil death penalty.
Four days later, we now know that argument was ineffective. In the case brought by former Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, the jury awarded the plaintiffs more than $148 million total in damages:
- $16,171,000 for Freeman on defamation
- $16,998,000 for Moss on defamation
- $20,000,000 for Freeman on emotional distress
- $20,000,000 for Moss on emotional distress
- $75,000,000 for both on punitive
Keep in mind, the point of these proceedings wasn’t to determine whether Giuliani defamed Freeman and Moss with a series of dangerous lies in the wake of the 2020 elections. In July, the Republican lawyer signed a statement conceding that he made “false” statements about the two women. A judge soon after agreed that the GOP lawyer did, in fact, defame Freeman and Moss, leading to court proceedings that would determine how much he owed the plaintiffs.
That question now has an answer — or more to the point, a nine-figure answer.
It probably didn’t help that on Monday night, as he left the New York courthouse, Giuliani told reporters, in reference to the plaintiffs, “Everything I said about them is true. They were engaging in changing votes.”
They were not engaging in changing votes. The fact that the defendant lied again, about the same people he’d already lied about, after his defamation trial was already underway, drew the attention of the presiding judge, and was brought to the attention of jurors as the trial neared its end. Common sense suggests this didn’t do his defense any favors.
In case anyone needs a refresher, let’s revisit our earlier coverage and review how we arrived at this point. In the immediate aftermath of his election defeat, Donald Trump falsely insisted that election workers in Atlanta…
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