Rudy Giuliani Agrees To Stop Spreading 2020 Election Lies About Georgia Election Workers
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Rudy Giuliani, Donald Trump’s former personal lawyer, has agreed to stop spreading lies about the two Georgia election workers he repeatedly defamed following Trump’s loss in the 2020 presidential race.
Giuliani conceded that he is permanently barred from sharing statements that suggest Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss “engaged in wrongdoing in connection with the 2020 presidential election,” according to a draft of the agreement filed in court Tuesday.
Following Trump’s defeat, Giuliani spread conspiracy theories about the two women, falsely claiming, among other things, that they brought in suitcases of illegal ballots while counting votes in Georgia’s Fulton County to alter the result in favor of the Democratic candidate, Joe Biden.
Biden won Georgia by 11,779 votes.
Freeman and Moss, a mother and daughter, first sued Giuliani for defamation in December 2021, saying the claims left them target to “an immediate onslaught of violent and racist threats and harassment.”
The former New York City mayor was found liable for defaming them last August after Giuliani had previously conceded sharing falsehoods about the pair. In December, he was ordered to pay $148 million in damages. The judge decreased the amount by about $2 million after the plaintiffs reached an agreement with another defendant in the case, the One American News network.
The Georgia election workers then sued Giuliani again, claiming he continued making derogatory statements about them, asking a judge for an injunction to permanently bar him from doing so.
In the meantime, Giuliani filed for bankruptcy.
The legal team of Freeman and Moss noted that Tuesday’s agreement stipulates that if Giuliani violates the injunction, he can be brought to court in Washington, D.C., and his bankruptcy won’t prevent him from being held accountable.
The agreement “ends his efforts to profit off of lies about these two heroes of American democracy,” Michael Gottlieb, a lawyer for the two women, said in a statement.
Ted Goodman, a spokesperson for Giuliani, said his client would stop commenting on Freeman and Moss under legal advice from his counsel.
“He will continue to comment on everything else surrounding the 2020 election,” Goodman said in a statement shared with multiple news outlets.
Separately, Giuliani pleaded not guilty to nine felony charges related to his efforts to undo the 2020 election results in Arizona, including pressing Maricopa County officials to reverse Biden’s win in the state. His trial has been scheduled for Oct. 17.
Giuliani was served with the indictment Friday at a party ahead of his upcoming 80th birthday after taunting state officials for not being able to locate him.
“If Arizona authorities can’t find me by tomorrow morning: 1. They must dismiss the indictment; 2. They must concede they can’t count votes,” he wrote in a now-deleted post on X, formerly Twitter, earlier that day.
Giuliani has also been suspended and removed from WABC radio after he repeatedly violated a ban on spreading 2020 election falsehoods.
WABC Radio owner John Catsimatidis told The New York Times that he “left me no option.”
