Rudy Giuliani Looks Like He Is in Serious Trouble: The former New York City mayor, seen as a national hero after the 9/11 attacks, was among those charged in the Georgia indictment on Monday
Rudy Giuliani’s Fate Is Already Sealed? Maybe So…
More than the other three indictments involving Donald Trump this year, the Georgia indictment handed down on Monday night is most reminiscent of the ones that followed Watergate, in that several people were indicted at once, including multiple individuals with familiar names. And the most familiar of all was that of Rudy Giuliani.
The former New York City mayor and presidential candidate, who was seen as a great national hero for his leadership in New York following the 9/11 attacks, has had something of a slow-motion fall from grace, involving both his work as Trump’s attorney and embarrassing public appearances.
There was Four Seasons Total Landscaping, his hair dye press conferences, his appearance in the second “Borat” movie, and his courtroom performance, which failed to succeed in overturning Trump’s 2020 loss.
But the charges Monday represent the first time Giuliani, who at one point was the nation’s best-known prosecutor, has actually faced criminal charges. And the charges, under Georgia’s state racketeering statute known as RICO, are similar to the laws he himself made pioneering use of when he prosecuted the mob as a U.S. attorney in the 1980s.
The former mayor was charged with 13 criminal counts, including making false statements and soliciting public officials to violate their oaths of office. One of the counts concerns Giuliani’s baseless accusation that two women who worked as election officials had committed voter fraud, a claim that had led to a previous civil suit. He is one of several prominent Trump attorneys named in the indictment, along with John Eastman, Sidney Powell, Jenna Ellis, and Kenneth Chesebro, as well as former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows.
“During several legislative hearings at the Georgia Capitol in December 2020, the former New York mayor and Trump attorney promoted unsupported allegations of widespread election fraud in Georgia,” the Associated Press said of Giuliani. “Prosecutors have said Rudy Giuliani was also involved a plan to have 16 Georgia Republicans serve as fake electors, falsely swearing that Trump had won the 2020 presidential election and declaring themselves the state’s ‘duly elected and qualified’ electors.’”
While these are the first charges against Giuliani, he has been under various investigations for the last several years, in relation to his work for Trump. One long-running probe involving Giuliani’s work in Ukraine ended in late 2022 when prosecutors announced that he would not face charges. Previously, the probe had entailed a raid on Giuliani’s office, from investigators looking into Giuliani’s efforts to prompt an investigation into Hunter Biden’s work in Ukraine. That investigation was led by prosecutors in the Southern District of New York, where Giuliani was once the U.S. attorney.
Giuliani has also faced disbarment proceedings, with a panel in Washington this summer recommending that he be stripped of his law license. And Special Counsel Jack Smith subpoenaed Giuliani in January, in connection with Trump’s fundraising off of stolen election claims, although Giuliani has not been indicted by Smith’s office, and none of the charges to date have specifically related to the fundraising operations.
The former mayor came out swinging against the Georgia indictment.
“This is an affront to American Democracy and does permanent, irrevocable harm to our justice system. It’s just the next chapter in a book of lies with the purpose of framing President Donald Trump and anyone willing to take on the ruling regime,” Giuliani said in a statement to the media after the charges.
“They lied about Russian collusion, they lied about Joe Biden’s foreign bribery scheme, and they lied about Hunter Biden’s laptop hard drive proving 30 years of criminal activity. The real criminals here are the people who have brought this case forward both directly and indirectly.”
Author Expertise and Experience:
Stephen Silver is a Senior Editor for 19FortyFive. He is an award-winning journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to the Philadelphia Inquirer, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver.
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