The former Mayor of New York City is making desperate efforts to escape his debts, including one hefty verdict stemming from his 2020 election lies, but Rudy Giuliani is only managing to dig himself deeper.
Rudy Giuliani begged a court to overturn the ruling from last year, in which he was ordered to pay $148 million to two women who he falsely accused of conspiring to “steal” the 2024 election from Donald Trump.
Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss shared their experience of being harassed, losing employment, and facing threats that sent them into hiding after the man who had served as Trump’s personal attorney spread false stories about them.
Now, Giuliani has filed for bankruptcy and is battling uphill to get through that process without losing the luxuries that wealth brought him, including his Palm Beach condo, but it’s not going well for him.
In a further blow on Monday, Giuliani’s appeal was denied. ABC reported:
“Giuliani’s renewed motion urging this Court to reverse its prior findings and rulings and to override the jury’s considered verdict on the basis of five threadbare arguments falls well short of persuading that ‘the evidence and all reasonable inferences that can be drawn therefrom are so one-sided that reasonable men and women could not have reached a verdict in [plaintiffs’] favor,'” U.S. District Judge Beryl A. Howell said in her ruling Monday.
The judge also slammed Giuliani (again) for his persistent refusal to comply with court orders. She referenced “the utter failure of Giuliani to comply with his discovery obligations and related orders in this lawsuit or to pay a dime in the attorney’s fees imposed for his discovery abuses,” and noted that he was only permitted to file further motions in the event that the court was assured neither he nor his estate would be paying the additional costs.
He argued that the verdict should be overturned because, among other arguments, there was not sufficient proof that the harm done to them was really his fault, rather than caused by some unidentified other parties.
Judge Beryl Howell called Giuliani out for failing to file his replies when the case was underway, “thereby forfeiting his opportunity to address plaintiffs’ vigorous opposition
to dismissal,” and for refusing to participate as required in the discovery process. She concluded:
“The jury’s verdict awarding plaintiffs compensatory and punitive damages for defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress caused by Giuliani and his co-conspirators…stands.”
It’s one more loss for Giuliani, but it remains to be seen, at the end of the bankruptcy process, how much of the money Freeman and Moss will ever actually see.
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