Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani dismissed that he had a drinking problem on Wednesday, following a report from The New York Times that detailed the drinking habits of the former Trump lawyer and adviser.
“If I have an alcohol problem, I should be in the ‘Guinness Book of World Records,'” Giuliani told reporters at a press conference in Concord, New Hampshire.
“79 years old and I’m an alcoholic. You know how much I have accomplished,” Giuliani added. “Nobody could have achieved that if they did [have a drinking problem]. … I was working 24 hours a day. It’s a big damn lie.”
Yet, the paper of record painted a very different picture of Giuliani’s drinking and suggested it had caught the attention of Trump prosecutors’ attention.
“To almost anyone in proximity, friends say, Mr. Giuliani’s drinking has been the pulsing drumbeat punctuating his descent — not the cause of his reputational collapse but the ubiquitous evidence, well before Election Day in 2020, that something was not right with the former president’s most incautious lieutenant,” The New York Times reported.
Giuliani in Trouble
Giuliani was indicted alongside Trump and 16 others in Georgia in August for their role in attempting to overturn the 2020 election. Prosecutors have apparently been focused on whether Trump had taken advice from or listened to Giuliani when he was clearly inebriated.
“The office of the special counsel, Jack Smith, has questioned witnesses about Mr. Giuliani’s alcohol consumption as he was advising Mr. Trump, including on election night, according to a person familiar with the matter. Mr. Smith’s investigators have also asked about Mr. Trump’s level of awareness of his lawyer’s drinking,” the paper added.
Trump’s team has already taken the so-called “advice-of-counsel” defense, a strategy that could portray him as a client merely taking professional cues from his lawyers. However, if the guidance came from someone the former president knew to be compromised by alcohol, especially after others told Trump that he had definitively lost the election, his argument could be greatly weakened.
Several witnesses have claimed that Giuliani appeared to be drunk on election night, and was slurring his words.
Rudy Fires Back
The former Big Apple mayor was quick to slam the Times, and called the outlet a “disgrace,” claiming the entire report was a lie. He even joked that he should sue the paper for its detailed report.
It was on Wednesday that Giuliani filed a defamation lawsuit in New Hampshire against President Joe Biden, his campaign, and several fundraising committees for comments that Biden made in 2020 in Nashville, Politico.com reported.
“[Trump’s] buddy Rudy Giuliani. He’s being used as a Russian pawn. He’s being fed information that is Russian — that is not true,” Biden said in October 2020, in which he accused Giuliani of being influenced by Russia in his claims about the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop.
Author Experience and Expertise:
A Senior Editor for 19FortyFive, Peter Suciu is a Michigan-based writer. He has contributed to more than four dozen magazines, newspapers, and websites with over 3,200 published pieces over a twenty-year career in journalism. He regularly writes about military hardware, firearms history, cybersecurity, politics, and international affairs. Peter is also a Contributing Writer for Forbes and Clearance Jobs. You can follow him on Twitter: @PeterSuciu.
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