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WASHINGTON — A federal judge on Friday found former Trump personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani in contempt of court in the defamation case against him involving former Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, the second such finding this week.
The ruling by U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell in Washington over additional defamatory comments made by Giuliani comes just days after U.S. District Judge Lewis Liman found him in contempt for failing to turn over financial information he’d been ordered to provide.
Giuliani, Howell said, “engaged in the worst kind of defamation” against the mother and daughter, which led to them being forced from their jobs and homes due to the avalanche of death threats Giuliani touched off with his repeated false claims.
Howell ordered Giuliani to submit a sworn declaration in the next 10 days that he had reviewed all the evidence in case, including testimony from the plaintiffs, that he and his attorneys had an opportunity to attend the depositions in the case, and affirm that he understands and acknowledges that all the sworn testimony in the case refutes his allegations of election fraud against the pair.
If he does not do so, he faces a $200 a day fine until he complies. If he hasn’t done so within 30 days, the judge said she could increase the amount of the fine. Future violations, she warned, could lead to jail time.
A spokesperson for Giuliani, Ted Goodman, said the contempt ruling “is designed to prevent Mayor Giuliani from exercising his constitutional rights.”
At the start of Friday’s hearing, an attorney for the two women, Michael Gottlieb, told the judge, “We don’t want to be here today.”
“The main thing the plaintiffs want is for Mr. Giuliani to stop defaming them,” he said. He had asked the judge to fine Giuliani $20,000 for each violation from financial assets that are off-limits to his creditors, like his IRA account, saying he believed that penalty would be “sufficiently steep.”
The contempt motion came after Giuliani made comments on his streaming show appearing to continue to claim the women committed fraud during the 2020 election despite a court-ordered agreement that he would not defame them anymore.
Howell told Giuliani that he needed to be mindful of his platform and the power of his words.
“You’re the most famous person in this courtroom right now, you’ve got a bigger audience, you’ve got a bigger public following than anyone in this courtroom,” the judge said.
Giuliani’s attorney, Eden Quainton, noted that Giuliani had abided by the agreement for several months before his livestream comments in November.
“So because he was good for a few months, we ought to excuse any bad behavior after that?” Howell questioned.
She was similarly unmoved by his argument that Giuliani did not demonstrate malice in his claims on his show since he truly believes Moss and Freeman committed election fraud, despite multiple investigations by Republican officials in Georgia that found they had not.
“So what, you’re saying this defamation is never going to stop? He’s never going to stop saying this because he thinks he’s right? That’s chilling,” the judge said.
Quainton said that was not the case, and argued the $20,000 figure for future violations would be “excessive.”
Giuliani was called to the stand to talk about his finances and complained that Freeman and Moss had an “army of lawyers” working for them.
Gottlieb responded that Giuliani currently has nine lawyers from eight law firms working for him, which Giuliani said was “flatly untrue.”
The judge then asked how many people in the courtroom worked for Giuliani, and identified a number of people.
Giuliani blasted the judge before the hearing even started, complaining in a post on X that the hearing was starting late and she was “making us wait all day for her inevitable highly prejudiced, usual, biased decision.”
“The hearing is a hypocritical waste of time and a disgusting example of Biden lawfare,” Giuliani wrote minutes before the proceeding began.
Giuliani has said that his comments on his show weren’t defamatory and that it “is my First Amendment right to talk about the case and my defense.”
His attorney argued in a court filing that the remarks were “vague” because he didn’t identify the women by name.
Freeman and Moss had sued Giuliani over his claims about them as he tried to help Trump, who was then president, overturn the 2020 election results. Howell found Giuliani liable in 2023 for defaming Freeman and Moss after he ignored repeated court orders to hand over evidence.
A jury awarded them $148 million in damages, which the judge reduced to $146 million. Giuliani is appealing the verdict.
Earlier this week, Liman found Giuliani to be in contempt of court for failing to comply with orders to turn over information about his assets to Freeman and Moss.
Giuliani had testified over two days about why he hadn’t yet handed over assets and court-ordered discovery information as part of the $146 million judgment.
One valuable asset he failed to turn over included a New York Yankees jersey autographed by Hall of Fame outfielder Joe DiMaggio, but Giuliani said last week that it was “missing.”
“I don’t know where it is, and it is hard to re-create who took it, and I am personally conducting my own investigation about this,” he said.
Liman has yet to announce how Giuliani will be sanctioned in that case.
Rebecca Shabad is a politics reporter for NBC News based in Washington.
Victoria Ebner is a researcher with NBC News based in Washington, D.C.
Dareh Gregorian is a politics reporter for NBC News.
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