Hopefully, Rudolph Giuliani’s battle with Covid-19 will go better than his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election. Right now, New York’s one-time iconic mayor, has nothing to show for desperation-filled legal maneuvers except a string of losses.
The battleground states have certified their election results while the courts have repeatedly rejected the president’s flailing gambits. For the moment anyway, the “will of the people” has prevailed. America’s systemic guardrails have shuddered not shattered.
Rather, Giuliani will be remembered as the lawyer whose hair dye ran amok under the klieg lights, the wild-eyed fellow who held a news conference sandwiched between a sex shop and a crematorium, and a desperately wishful septuagenarian caught on film with his hands down his pants. Yesterday really is so far away.
Once upon a time, Giuliani made headlines as a crime-busting federal prosecutor who sent mob bosses and errant stockbrokers alike to prison. Rudy was the mayor who embodied national resolve as the twin towers collapsed and a country fell under attack. Now, he stands legally exposed and reportedly beseeches a president for a pardon.
Sadly, more than a month has passed since election day and yet the president and his lawyer-in-chief have refused to accede to reality. Instead, Giuliani peddles conspiracy theories to the public even as he declines to make them centerpieces in the courtroom.
The US court of appeals for the third circuit framed things this way: “calling an election unfair does not make it so”. Finding that that Trump campaign failed to either allege or prove fraud, the court also used Giuliani’s own words to doom his client’s case. “As lawyer Rudolph Giuliani stressed, the campaign ‘doesn’t plead fraud … this is not a fraud case’,” it opined. Fear of sanctions can deter performative pronouncements.
Equally worrisome for Giuliani and Donald Trump is the fact that the supreme court has not ridden to their rescue. With just a week left until the electoral college convenes, the court is finally in the process of receiving submissions from the parties. No date for oral argument has been set, and there is no assurance that it will be. Said differently, this election is not poised to be a replay of Florida 2000 and Bush v Gore. In so many ways.
Back then, Al Gore won the popular vote but conceded defeat in the face of the court’s 5-4 decision, one that the late Justice Antonin Scalia confessed was, “as we say in Brooklyn, a piece of shit”. For the record, Giuliani spent his early years in that New York City outer borough and attended high school there.
But Trump and Giuliani chose a different path. Instead, Giuliani flew across the US and told receptive audiences that the election was rigged and that the late Hugo Chávez acted from the grave and in cahoots with George Soros to steal the president’s patrimony. All that is missing from this tableau are the Illuminati and the Freemasons. To put things in context, William Barr, the attorney general, will no longer vouch for this nonsense, and is contemplating an early departure.
Beyond that, in the process of selling a false reality, Giuliani refused to wear a mask and expected others to do the same – just like Trump. As a result, Arizona’s legislature is closed for a week “out of an abundance of caution” after Giuliani potentially exposed GOP lawmakers to the disease. Meanwhile in Michigan, the head of the Republican party and its staffers are now being tested for the virus. Giuliani also appeared in Georgia.
Giuliani’s antics have won the admiration and approval of the president, while at the same time the ire of others, including those who once worked for him. Like the president, Giuliani does not command long-term loyalty.
Ken Frydman, press secretary to the 1993 Giuliani campaign, told the Guardian “karma is a bitch.” Another former Giuliani deputy wished the mayor a speedy recovery but remained critical of his recent follies.
This city hall veteran explained that it was “unfortunate and sad” that Giuliani was in this situation. At the same time, he called Giuliani’s predicament “entirely due to his own recklessness in the face of a raging pandemic and to his blind fealty to worshipping at the altar of Trump”.
Think of Covid-19 as a feature, not a bug, for those in the president’s orbit. In addition to Trump, others close to the president victimized by the disease include Melania Trump, two of his sons, the White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, Ben Carson, a Trump cabinet member, and Chris Christie, a key surrogate. Covid-19 even claimed the life of Herman Cain after he attended a Trump rally in Oklahoma.
As the US approaches 300,000 deaths, it is safe to say that Trump is bad for your health. And now, Giuliani knows that as a matter of personal experience. None this will make Trump’s legal climb any easier.
Source: US Politics - theguardian.com
