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    ‘A formulaic game’: former officials say Trump’s attacks threaten rule of law

    As Donald Trump faces 91 felony counts with four trials slated for 2024, including two tied to his drives to overturn his 2020 election loss, his attacks on prosecutors are increasingly conspiratorial and authoritarian in style and threaten the rule of law, say former justice department officials.The former US president’s vitriolic attacks on a special counsel and two state prosecutors as well as some judges claim in part that the charges against Trump amount to “election interference” since he’s seeking the presidency again, and that “presidential immunity” protects Trump for his multiple actions to subvert Joe Biden’s 2020 victory.But ex-officials and other experts say Trump’s campaign and social media bashing of the four sets of criminal charges – echoed in ways by his lawyers’ court briefs – are actually a hodgepodge of conspiracy theories and very tenuous legal claims, laced with Trump’s narcissism and authoritarian impulses aimed at delaying his trials or quashing the charges.Much of Trump’s animus is aimed at the special counsel Jack Smith, who has charged him with four felony counts for election subversion, and 40 felony counts for mishandling classified documents when his presidency ended.Trump’s chief goal in attacking Smith, whom he’s labelled a “deranged lunatic”, and other prosecutors and judges is to delay his trials well into 2024, or until after the election, when Trump could pardon himself if he wins, experts say.Similarly, Trump has targeted the Fulton county district attorney, Fani Willis, who has brought a racketeering case in Georgia against Trump and 18 others for trying to overturn Biden’s win there, branding her a “rabid partisan”.Right before Christmas, Trump’s lawyers asked an appeals court in Washington to throw out Smith’s four-count subversion indictment, arguing that his actions occurred while he was in office and merited presidential immunity, and Trump in a Truth Social post on Christmas Eve blasted Smith for “election interference”.In an 82-page brief rebutting Trump’s lawyers on December 30, Smith and his legal team wrote that Trump’s efforts to overturn the election results in 2020 “threaten to undermine democracy,” and stressed Trump’s sweeping immunity claims for all his actions while in office “threatens to license Presidents to commit crimes to remain in office.”Former justice department officials say Trump’s rhetoric and tactics to tar prosecutors and judges are diversionary moves to distract from the serious charges he faces – especially for trying to subvert the 2020 election.“Claiming the federal criminal cases or the Georgia Rico action are election interference, and railing constantly about the character of the prosecutors, judges and others, is just a formulaic game to Trump,” Ty Cobb, a White House counsel during the Trump years and a former DoJ official, said.“Delay is his major strategic objective in all these cases. These criminal cases were started because of Trump’s criminal acts and his refusal to allow the peaceful transfer of government for the first time in US history. Trump’s constitutional objections to the trial-related issues are all frivolous including his claim of presidential immunity and double jeopardy.”Cobb added that Trump’s “everyone is bad but me and I am the victim” rants, lies and frivolous imperious motions and appeals are just his “authoritarianism in service of his narcissism”.Other ex-officials offer equally harsh assessments of Trump’s defenses.“The reality is that Trump has clearly done a series of illegal things and the system is holding him to account for things that he’s done,” said the former deputy attorney general Donald Ayer, who served during the George HW Bush administration. “He’s telling more lies to mischaracterize prosecutions that we should be thankful for.”Yet Trump keeps escalating his high-voltage rhetoric and revealing his authoritarian tendencies. Trump even bragged that Russian president Vladimir Putin in December echoed Trump’s charges of political persecution and election interference to bolster his claims.“Even Vladimir Putin … says that Biden’s – and this is a quote – ‘politically motivated persecution of his political rival is very good for Russia because it shows the rottenness of the American political system, which cannot pretend to teach others about democracy’,” Trump told a campaign rally in Durham, New Hampshire.For good measure, Trump complimented two other foreign authoritarian leaders, calling Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán, “highly respected” and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un “very nice”.In November Trump sparked fire for slamming his opponents on the left as “vermin”, a term that echoed Adolf Hitler’s language, and the ex-president has more than once pledged in authoritarian style to appoint a special prosecutor to “go after” Biden and his family.Likewise, critics have voiced alarm at Trump’s vow of “retribution” against some powerful foes in both parties if he’s re-elected, including ex-attorney general Bill Barr. That pledge fits with Trump painting himself a victim of a vendetta by “deep state” forces at the justice department, the FBI and other agencies Trump and his allies want to rein in while expanding his executive authority, if he’s the Republican nominee and wins the presidency again.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionCritics say Trump’s attacks on the prosecutions are increasingly conspiratorial.“Of course, it’s true that Trump is the undisputed master of election interference, so he certainly knows the field,” Democratic congressman Jamie Raskin, a leading Trump critic in the House, said.“It’s hard to think of a greater case of election interference than what Trump did in 2020 and 2021. His claim of election interference is meant to give him a kind of political immunity from the consequences of his criminal actions.“He’s basically inviting the public to believe that the legal system’s response to his stealing government documents or trying to overthrow an election are illegal attempts to interfere with his political career.”Raskin noted there was some Trump-style logic to citing Putin in his defense.“We know Putin is Trump’s hero and effective cult master,” the congressman said. “So it makes sense that Trump would try to elevate him as a kind of moral arbiter. Trump would love a world where Vladimir Putin would decide the integrity of elections and prosecutions. Wouldn’t that be nice for the autocrats?”Trump’s modus operandi to stave off his trials is emblematic of how he has operated in the past, say some ex-prosecutors.“Trump has a habit of picking up allegations made against him and, like a kid in the playground, accusing the critics of doing the same thing”, such as crying “electoral interference”, said the Columbia law professor and former federal prosecutor Daniel Richman.Richman stressed that “I wouldn’t assume Trump is trying to mimic other authoritarians. He just shares their values, or the lack of them.”Other scholars see Trump’s desperate defenses and incendiary attacks on the legal system as part of his DNA.“The Trump team is looking to cobble together a defense for the indefensible,” said Timothy Naftali, a senior research scholar at Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs. “Trump has long been looking for and finding ways to protect himself whenever he crosses legal lines. This is who he is.”Naftali suggested: “Trump announced his second re-election bid much earlier than is traditional for major candidates. A likely reason why he announced so early – and then hardly campaigned for a long time – was to pre-empt any indictments so that he could later denounce them as ‘election interference’ and perhaps undermine any future trials. This is a man who lies and creates a reality most favorable to him.”More broadly, Raskin views Trump’s attacks on the legal system as hallmarks of fascist rulers.“Fascism is all about the destruction of the rule of law in the service of a dictator. It’s important for Trump to continue to attack our essential legal institutions. He’s also gotten to the point of dehumanizing his opponents by using words like ‘vermin’. Violence permeates his rhetoric,” he said.“Trump feels entirely emboldened by his supporters. He’s been given license by the Republican party to go as far as he wants.” More

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    Michigan supreme court rules that Trump will stay on state ballot

    Donald Trump will remain on Michigan’s state ballot after a ruling from the Michigan supreme court on Wednesday, which upheld a lower court order.The move sets the stage for the former president to participate in the Michigan primary despite accusations that he led an insurrection against the United States.The court’s decision not to move forward with a case against Trump sets the court in sharp contrast to the Colorado supreme court, which recently ruled to strip Trump from its state primary ballot because of his role in the January 6 riot at the US Capitol.In Michigan, as in Colorado, the challengers have invoked section 3 of the US constitution’s 14th amendment, which broadly blocks people from holding government office if they “have engaged in insurrection or rebellion” against the US government. Legal experts are divided on whether this provision, written against the backdrop of the US civil war, applies to the office of the president. There are also questions as to whether Trump’s actions around January 6 legally constitute “insurrection or rebellion”.Colorado’s decision is currently paused on appeal. Special counsel Jack Smith has asked the US supreme court to fast-track the decision, but the nation’s highest court – which is dominated 6-3 by conservatives – has declined. However, the court will likely weigh in soon.The Michigan supreme court justices did not give a reasoning for their Wednesday decision.“We are not persuaded that the questions presented should be reviewed by this court,” the justices wrote in an unsigned, one-paragraph order.However, in a dissent where she largely agreed with the court’s order, Justice Elizabeth Welch said that procedural differences may make the difference in Colorado and Michigan’s election laws. The challengers in the case, she added, may “renew their legal efforts as to the Michigan general election later in 2024 should Trump become the Republican nominee for President of the United States or seek such office as an independent candidate”.Free Speech for the People, the group that brought the lawsuit, stressed that the Michigan supreme court’s decision was made on procedural grounds.“We are disappointed by the Michigan Supreme Court’s decision,” said Ron Fein, legal director of Free Speech For People, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said in a statement. But, Fein added: “The decision isn’t binding on any court outside Michigan and we continue our current and planned legal actions in other states to enforce Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment against Donald Trump.”Michigan is expected to be a battleground state in the 2024 US presidential election. Its primary is set for 27 February 2024. More

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    Trump asks appeals court to throw out 2020 election subversion charges

    Donald Trump has asked an appeals court in Washington DC to throw out charges that he sought to subvert the 2020 election, in the latest of a series of high-stakes legal maneuvers between the former president’s lawyers and the US department of justice.In a filing late on Saturday lawyers for Trump argued to the DC circuit court of appeals that he is legally cloaked from liability for actions he took while serving as president.The move came a day after the US supreme court declined to expedite a request by the special counsel Jack Smith to consider the question of presidential immunity from prosecution.The latest filing is an incremental advance on the long-running legal duels between Trump and the special counsel, who may not now be able to bring the election interference complaint, one of four separate criminal cases against Trump, before a jury ahead of the next year’s election.If the election interference case is delayed, and Trump wins the election as current polls suggest he could, the former president could simply order all federal charges against him to be dropped.In Saturday’s 55-page brief to the appeals court, Trump’s lawyer D John Sauer argued in essence that under the US constitution one branch of government cannot assert judgement over another.“Under our system of separated powers, the judicial branch cannot sit in judgment over a president’s official acts,” Sauer wrote. “That doctrine is not controversial,” he added.The filing repeats what Trump’s lawyers have consistently said: that he was acting in an official capacity to ensure election integrity, and therefore under immunity because presidents cannot be criminally prosecuted for “official acts”.Under the constitution, only the Senate can impeach and convict a president – and that effort failed.In the filing, Sauer argued that executive immunity must exist because no president or former president has previously been charged with a crime.“The unbroken tradition of not exercising the supposed formidable power of criminally prosecuting a president for official acts – despite ample motive and opportunity to do so, over centuries – implies that the power does not exist,” he wrote.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionHe also said that Tanya Chutkan, the judge due to hear case against Trump, was mistaken in her interpretation of limited presidential immunity when she wrote that Trump should still be “subject to federal investigation, indictment, prosecution, conviction and punishment for any criminal acts undertaken while in office”.The interplay of legislative, executive and judicial power now lie at the center of the 2024 election. Last week, Colorado’s supreme court ruled that Trump was ineligible to be on the ballot in that state because of his alleged actions to resist certification of the popular vote in 2020.But the implementation of the ruling was delayed until next month when the US supreme court may look at it.On Saturday evening, before heading to Camp David for the holiday break, Joe Biden said he “can’t think of one” reason presidents should receive absolute immunity from prosecution, as the Republican frontrunner Donald Trump has claimed. More

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    Trump pressured Michigan election officers not to certify 2020 vote – report

    Donald Trump made a phone call in November 2020 in which he put pressure on two Republican election officers in Michigan not to sign the official document from the state confirming that Joe Biden had won the presidential election there, according to an exclusive report by The Detroit News late on Thursday.The Detroit News outlet has obtained recordings of the call, made on 17 November 2020, where Trump, who was refusing to accept that he had just lost the White House to Joe Biden, and Republican National Committee Chair Ronna McDaniel talked to Wayne county election officials Monica Palmer and William Hartmann and told them they would look “terrible” if they signed to endorse Trump’s defeat in the crucial swing state, according to the report.Palmer and Harmann were members of the Wayne county board of canvassers, one of the state’s official county teams – each with two Democrats and two Republicans – appointed by state election commissioners for duties such as inspecting ballots and certifying elections for all local, countywide and district offices.Trump told them on the phone call obtained and reported by the Detroit News that: “We’ve got to fight for our country. We can’t let these people take our country away from us.”McDaniel is from Michigan and was also reportedly on the call and told the two board members: “If you can go home tonight, do not sign it,” adding “We will get you attorneys.”Trump then added: “We’ll take care of that.”The newspaper further reported that representatives of Palmer, McDaniel and Trump, contacted by the reporter in question through spokespeople, did not dispute a summary of the call that was shared with them. The News said Hartmann died in 2021.On Thursday Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung issued a statement saying that Trump’s call was “taken in furtherance of his duty as president of the United States to faithfully take care of the laws and ensure election integrity, including investigating the rigged and stolen 2020 presidential election”.The call and then Palmer and Harmann’s refusal to add their signatures to Wayne county’s official certification of Biden’s victory at the ballot box was apparently designed to sow doubt about the accuracy of the result.Palmer and Hartmann’s refusal to sign the certification and a failed attempt to withdraw their votes from the day before in which they confirmed Biden’s victory in the county did not impede Biden’s win in Michigan. That was a crucial piece of his 2020 victory on behalf of the Democratic party, with he and now-US vice president Kamala Harris beating Republicans Trump and his Vice-President Mike Pence’s bid for re-election.The report of the phone call has strong echoes of the call Trump made on 2 January 2021, in which he pressed the secretary of state in Georgia, Brad Raffensperger, to “find” enough votes to overturn Joe Biden’s victory in that state, too. News of the phone call emerged almost immediately.The pressure on Raffensperger is part of the criminal case against Trump and multiple co-defendants in Georgia, accusing them in a racketeering case of an election interference conspiracy.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe Wayne county tapes in Michigan are understood not to be part at this time of the federal election interference case against Trump brought by special counsel Jack Smith on behalf of the US Department of Justice.Michigan officials are still investigating Trump’s efforts to overturn his defeat in the state in 2020. The primary season for the 2024 presidential election begins in January and Trump is the frontrunner for the Republican nomination as he seeks re-election despite facing dozens of indictments in four criminal cases – two federal cases, in which the US supreme court has now become involved, as well as one in New York and the one in Georgia.Jonathan Kinloch, a Wayne county board of canvassers member, but one of the two Democrats, told the Detroit News that the phone call from Trump and McDaniel that the outlet just reported was “insane”.“It’s just shocking that the president of the United States was at the most minute level trying to stop the election process from happening,” Kinlock told the News. More

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    Rudy Giuliani’s Chapter 11 filing lists debts totaling up to $500m

    Paperwork submitted in Rudy Giuliani’s filing for bankruptcy protection reveal the daunting extent of debts faced by the former New York mayor turned Trump lawyer. It is a mountain added to this week by a $148m award to two former Georgia election workers.Giuliani, 79, claimed Ruby Freeman and Wandrea “Shaye” Moss were involved in electoral fraud as part of Joe Biden’s victory over Donald Trump in 2020.His claims were debunked and the women sued for defamation. Their award was determined last week, a decision Giuliani called “absurd”. This week a judge said the women could collect immediately. Freeman and Moss also sued Giuliani again, to stop him repeating his claims.The $148m award was included in a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing made by Giuliani in the southern district of New York on Thursday.Other sums over $1m were also listed.They include claims from Daniel Gill, a New York man who last year slapped Giuliani on the back and asked, “What’s up, scumbag?” and was subsequently charged with assault, who has sued for $2m this year.Davidoff, Hutcher & Citron, a law firm, claims $1.36m. That suit, over unpaid fees, was lodged by Robert Costello, Giuliani’s longtime lawyer, in September.Other claims were listed as “unknown”. Among them is a claim from Noelle Dunphy – a former associate who sued Giuliani in May for $10m, alleging “abuses of power, wide-ranging sexual assault and harassment, wage theft and other misconduct”. Another claim is from Hunter Biden, Joe Biden’s son, who sued in September, alleging “total annihilation” of his digital privacy through attempts to tie his legal and personal problems to his father, through claims about a hard drive and laptop computer.Claims from the voting machine companies Smartmatic and Dominion Voting Systems, in lawsuits over false allegations of electoral fraud, are also listed as “unknown”.Other claimants listed in the five-page filing are: Eric Coomer, a Dominion employee (for an unknown sum); BST & Co, New York accountants ($10,000); the Internal Revenue Service (income tax claims at $521,345 and $202,887); Aidala, Bertuna & Kamins, a law firm Giuliani hired in 2021 after the FBI raided his apartment ($387,859.98); Momentum Telecom ($30,000); and the New York state department of taxation and finance ($204,346 and $61,340).skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionIn other paperwork, Giuliani said he had as many as 49 creditors and owed between $100m and $500m. His assets were estimated at between $1m and $10m.Giuliani’s spokesperson and adviser, Ted Goodman, said: “The filing should be a surprise to no one. No person could have reasonably believed that Mayor Rudy Giuliani would be able to pay such a high punitive amount” as awarded in the Georgia defamation case.Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, Goodman added, “will afford Mayor Giuliani the opportunity and time to pursue an appeal, while providing transparency for his finances under the supervision of the bankruptcy court, to ensure all creditors are treated equally and fairly throughout the process”.David Axelrod, a former aide to Barack Obama turned political commentator, tweeted: “Giuliani files for bankruptcy protection but there is no escape from MORAL bankruptcy, which will be his lasting legacy.” More

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    Prosecutors gain access to majority of Trump ally Scott Perry’s phone

    A federal judge ordered the top House Republican Scott Perry to turn over nearly 1,700 records from his phone to special counsel prosecutors that could inform the extent of his role in Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election results, including removing justice department officials.The move by the chief US district judge James Boasberg, who oversees grand jury matters in federal court in Washington DC, means prosecutors can access the majority of the records that the FBI pulled from Perry’s phone. The device was seized in response to a court-approved warrant.Boasberg ordered Perry to produce 1,656 out of 2,055 records. The US court of appeals for the DC circuit directed Perry to individually review which materials were protected by the speech or debate clause, which shields members of Congress from legal peril connected to their official duties, and allowed him to withhold those records.The records include some of Perry’s discussions about efforts to influence the executive branch and state officials, some communications about influencing the conduct of executive branch officials – including that of the former vice-president Mike Pence, according to Boasberg’s 12-page memo.What the special counsel Jack Smith will do with the records remains unclear, given his office previously charged Trump with conspiring to reverse his 2020 election defeat without the materials back in July. Perry can also still appeal the way Boasberg applied the speech or debate clause to his communications.A defense lawyer for Perry declined to say what determinations the Pennsylvania congressman might challenge.The ruling marks the latest twist in the constitutionally fraught case. Last year, the previous chief judge, Beryl Howell, ordered Perry to turn over 2,055 of 2,219 records after finding that speech or debate protections did not apply to informal fact-finding done by members of Congress.Perry appealed to the DC circuit, which overturned Howell’s ruling in September. The court decided that “informal fact-finding” that was not part of a committee investigation, for instance, did in fact qualify as official legislative business as protected by the speech or debate clause.The three-judge panel at the DC circuit of Neomi Rao, Gregory Katsas and Karen Henderson – nominated by Trump and George HW Bush – directed Boasberg to individually re-review the records using their stricter interpretation of speech or debate protections.According to his memo, Boasberg broke down the records into three broad categories: Perry’s communications with people outside the US government, Perry’s communications with members of Congress and staff, and Perry’s communications involving members of the executive branch.The records not withheld in category one most notably included communications about procedures that Pence had to follow at the joint session of Congress to certify the election results and communications about what occurred during the January 6 Capitol attack, the memo said.Category two had more items that were withheld, such as Perry’s discussions about whether to certify the electoral votes on January 6. But Boasberg turned over Perry’s discussions about working with the executive branch and state officials on election fraud issues and influencing their conduct.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe records not withheld in category three most notably included communications that tried to influence executive branch officials’ conduct, discussions about non-legislative efforts to combat alleged election fraud, and again, procedures that Pence had to follow on January 6.Perry was the subject of special interest by the House select committee investigation into the Capitol attack because of the outsize role he played in introducing to Trump a justice department official, Jeffrey Clark, who was sympathetic to Trump’s claims about alleged election fraud.The introduction led Clark to propose sending a letter to officials in Georgia that falsely said the justice department was investigating election fraud in the state. When the acting attorney general, Jeffrey Rosen, balked, Trump suggested he would replace him with Clark so the letter would be sent.Trump only relented when he was told by Rosen that the justice department leadership would resign and the White House counsel, Pat Cipollone, said he and his deputy, Patrick Philbin, would also quit if Trump followed through. Clark never became the acting attorney general.In August, Trump and his top allies – including Clark – were charged by the Fulton county district attorney, Fani Willis, with violating the Georgia racketeering statute over their efforts to overturn the 2020 election results in the state. Trump and Clark have both pleaded not guilty. More

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    Georgia election workers sue to bar Giuliani from repeating same 2020 lies

    Two former Georgia election workers who won a $148m defamation judgment against Rudy Giuliani asked on Monday for a court order barring him from continuing to repeat the lies he spread about them following the 2020 election.The new lawsuit points to comments the former New York City mayor made during and after the damages trial last week, repeating the baseless conspiracy theories about Ruby Freeman and Wandrea “Shaye” Moss.Those statements “make clear that he intends to persist in his campaign of targeted defamation and harassment. It must stop,” attorneys for the mother and daughter wrote in court documents.Giuliani’s political adviser Ted Goodman declined to comment on the lawsuit but pointed to the former mayor’s other accomplishments, including his celebrated leadership after the 11 September terrorist attacks in 2001.Giuliani has previously acknowledged in court documents that he made public comments falsely claiming Freeman and Moss committed ballot fraud as he fought to keep his fellow Republican Donald Trump in the White House after Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election.Those claims led to racist threats and intense harassment that forced the mother and daughter to flee their homes and fear for their lives, they said in emotional testimony last week. The trial was held to determine the amount of damages after a judge found he was liable for defaming them.Giuliani has vowed to appeal the verdict, and it is not clear whether he would be able to pay the staggering damages. He has shown signs of financial strain as he defends himself against costly lawsuits and investigations stemming from his representation of Trump.Also, Giuliani is among 19 people charged in Georgia in the case accusing Trump and his Republican allies of working to subvert the state’s 2020 election results. Giuliani has pleaded not guilty and has characterized the case as politically motivated. More

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    Rudy Giuliani dismisses $148m damages verdict as ‘absurd’ as former election workers praise decision – as it happened

    A jury has ordered Rudy Giuliani to pay former election workers Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Shaye Moss, $148.1m after he spread lies about them following the 2020 election. It is one of the most significant verdicts to date seeking accountability for those who attempted to overturn the 2020 election.
    There were gasps in the courtroom when the amount was read out and the judge stumbled over the number as she read out the verdict, according to media reports.
    Giuliani did not appear to show any emotion as the damages were announced. Former Atlanta election workers Freeman and Moss hugged their attorney after the amount was announced.
    The damages were $100m above what the women had asked for and included nearly $16.2m and $17m in compensatory damages for Freeman and Moss respectively. It also included $20m to each woman for intentional infliction of emotional distress, and an additional $75m in punitive damages. Giuliani owes approximately $275,000 in additional legal fees.
    Giuliani himself dismissed the verdict and told reporters outside the Washington federal courthouse that he will appeal, saying the “absurdity of the number merely underscores the absurdity of the entire proceeding”. “It will be reversed so quickly it will make your head spin, and the absurd number that just came in will help that actually,” he said.
    Speaking outside court on Friday, Freeman said: “Today’s a good day. A jury stood witness to what Rudy Giuliani did to me and my daughter and held him accountable, and for that I’m thankful. Today is not the end of the road, we still have work to do. Rudy Giuliani was not the only one who spread lies about us, and others must be held accountable too. But that is tomorrow’s work.”
    Freeman’s daughter, Shaye Moss, also gave a statement, saying: “The flame that Giuliani lit with those lies and passed to so many others to keep that flame blazing changed every aspect of our lives – our homes, our family, our work, our sense of safety, our mental health. And we’re still working to rebuild.”
    This is the end of our live coverage of the damages trial. You can read the full report by Sam Levine here:And Rachel Leingang has looked at how the multimillion-dollar ruling against Giuliani shows the cost of spreading election lies:Thanks for following along.A legal analyst for CNN explains that the punitive damages awarded to two former election workers were intended to “send a message to Rudy Giuliani and to the general public”.Elie Honig told Jake Tapper: “When we think about the inequities in this case, when we think about an extraordinarily powerful, remorseless liar like Rudy Giuliani, compared to these women or civil servants, they never signed up for this. Their lives were turned over and I think that’s why you see such a high number here from the jury.”Here are a few of the pictures that have dropped on the newswires from outside the court after the verdict:The damages included nearly $16.2m and $17m in compensatory damages for Freeman and Moss respectively.It also included $20m to each woman for intentional infliction of emotional distress, and an additional $75m in punitive damages.Giuliani owes approximately $275,000 in additional legal fees.Here’s some more reaction to the verdict:After the verdict, Giuliani appeared to be trying to rewrite history by claiming he hadn’t been able to present his side of the argument in court.Giuliani had in fact been due to testify on Thursday but declined to do so at the last moment.On Friday, he tried to paint a different picture, telling reporters: “I’ve not been allowed to present a single piece of evidence in defence, of which I have a lot.“I am quite confident when this case gets before a fair tribunal it’ll be reversed so quickly it’ll make your head spin.”Here is video of that statement:My colleague Rachel Leingang has written this analysis about the staggering damages award:
    The judge had already decided Rudy Giuliani defamed the two former Georgia election workers, the question was just how much that cycle of lies and ensuing harassment should cost him.
    A jury declared on Friday that it was worth an eye-popping $148m, far beyond expectations and a major blow to the former New York mayor and key Donald Trump ally.
    The case was one of a handful of ways pro-democracy groups are seeking consequences for election subversion ahead of the next presidential election. The plaintiffs hope the high-dollar decision will show to Giuliani and others that there’s a financial and human cost to spreading lies. The stakes are high with the 2024 presidential election quickly approaching and Trump probably on the ballot once again.
    You can read her full piece here:In her statement after the trial, Ruby Freeman gave an insight into the continued impact of Giuliani’s false claims on her life.She said:
    Today is not the end of the road. We still have work to do. Rudy Giuliani wasn’t the only one who spread lies about us and others must be held accountable too.
    But that is tomorrow’s work. For now I want people to understand this. Money would never solve all of my problems. I can never move back to the house that I call home. I will always have to be careful about where I go and who I choose to share my name with.
    I miss my home, I miss my neighbors and I miss my name.
    Moss went on to thank the court and jury for listening to her and her mother’s experience in the aftermath of Giuliani’s defamatory statements.Her voice broke slightly when she added: “I know I won’t be able to retire from my job with the county like my grandma did, but I hope having taken these very big steps towards justice, I can make her proud.”Here is more from what Shaye Moss said outside the court:
    The lies Rudy Giuliani told about me and my mommy after the 2020 presidential election have changed our lives and the past few years has been devastating.
    The flame that Giuliani lit with those lies and passed to so many others to keep that flame blazing changed every aspect of our lives – our homes, our family, our work, our sense of safety, our mental health. And we’re still working to rebuild.
    As we move forward and continue to seek justice, our greatest wish is that no one … ever experiences anything like what we went through.
    Today’s verdict comes at the end of an emotional week for former election workers Moss and Freeman. They had to relive their ordeal in testimony at the federal court in Washington DC and told how it had ruined their lives.Here are some of the key moments from this week’s trial:
    Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss both testified about the disastrous effects of lies spread by Rudy Giuliani and others who put them at the center of an election conspiracy theory. They shared examples of the racist, harassing, threatening messages they received after being publicly named by election deniers.
    Freeman said she had to leave her home for safety reasons. She hired a lawyer to help keep her name off any home-related documents for her new place. She feels like she’s lost who she is, her good name, in this web.
    Moss detailed how these actions made her anxious to even leave the house and caused her son to get harassed, eventually failing his classes. She said she still doesn’t really go out.
    Giuliani was initially expected to testify. But after two separate incidents of him doubling down, his team did not put him on the stand. His lawyer said the women had been through enough, but also pointed to Gateway Pundit, the rightwing media outlet, as more culpable for the harassment.
    Ashlee Humphreys, a professor from Northwestern University and an expert witness of Freeman and Moss, walked through the significant reputational damage done to Freeman and Moss, showing how their names are now associated with election fraud.
    Freeman and Moss’ lawyer, Michael Gottlieb, said they hope the case sends a clear message to people launching smear campaigns not to do it.
    The jury began deliberations on Thursday and returned their verdict on Friday afternoon.
    The sum awarded to Freeman and Moss was $100m above what they had asked for – and media reports said gasps were heard in the courtroom when the final sum was read out. CNN reported the judge stumbled over her words when reading out the final sum.The verdict is likely to be far beyond Giuliani’s means. In closing arguments, his lawyer, Joseph Sibley, said the original $48m amount would be “catastrophic” for his client.Meanwhile, the plaintiffs’ attorney Michael Gottlieb argued: “Mr Giuliani thought he could get away with making Ruby and Shaye the face of election fraud because he thought they were ordinary and expendable.“He has no right to offer defenseless civil servants up to a virtual mob in order to overturn an election.”My colleague Sam Levine has more from Freeman’s statement outside the court:“Today is not the end of the road, we still have work to do. Rudy Giuliani was not the only one who spread lies about us, and others must be held accountable too. But that is tomorrow’s work.“I want people to understand this,” she added. “Money will never solve all my problems. I can never move back into the house that I call home. I will always have to be careful about where I go and who I choose to share my name with. I miss my home, I miss my neighbors, and I miss my name.”Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss gave a statement outside court after they were awarded $148m in damages.Freeman said: “A jury stood witness to what Rudy Giuliani did to me and my daughter and how I answered that. I’m thankful.”The judgment adds to growing financial and legal peril for Giuliani, who was among the loudest proponents of Trump’s false claims of election fraud that are now a key part of the criminal cases against the former president, AP writes.Giuliani had already been showing signs of financial strain as he defends himself against costly lawsuits and investigations stemming from his representation of Trump. His lawyer suggested that the defamation case could financially ruin the former mayor, saying “it would be the end of Mr Giuliani.”Giuliani told reporters outside Washington’s federal courthouse that he will appeal, saying the “absurdity of the number merely underscores the absurdity of the entire proceeding”.“It will be reversed so quickly it will make your head spin, and the absurd number that just came in will help that actually,” he said.Giuliani had already been found liable in the case and previously conceded in court documents that he falsely accused the women of ballot fraud.Even so, the former New York City mayor continued to repeat his baseless allegations about the women in comments to reporters outside the Washington DC courthouse this week.Giuliani’s lawyer acknowledged that his client was wrong but insisted that Giuliani was not fully responsible for the vitriol the women faced. The defense sought to largely pin the blame on a rightwing website that published the surveillance video of the two women counting ballots.AP has a bit more from the hearing today:
    The damages verdict follows emotional testimony from Wandrea “Shaye” Moss and her mother, Ruby Freeman, who tearfully described becoming the target of a false conspiracy theory pushed by Giuliani and other Republicans as they tried to keep then-President Donald Trump in power after he lost the 2020 election.
    There was an audible gasp in the courtroom when the jury foreperson read aloud the $75 million award in punitive damages for the women. Moss and Freeman were each awarded another roughly $36 million in other damages.
    Giuliani didn’t appear to show any emotion as the verdict was read after about 10 hours of deliberations. Moss and Freeman hugged their attorneys after the jury left the courtroom and didn’t look at Giuliani as he left with his lawyer.
    Giuliani told reporters outside Washington’s federal courthouse that he will appeal, saying the “absurdity of the number merely underscores the absurdity of the entire proceeding.”
    A Washington DC jury has ordered Rudy Giuliani to pay $148.1m to two Atlanta election workers after he spread lies about them, one of the most significant verdicts to date seeking accountability for those who attempted to overturn the 2020 election.The verdict follows a four-day trial in which Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, her daughter, gave haunting details about the harassment and threats they faced after Giuliani falsely accused them of trying to steal the election in Georgia. The women, who are Black, described how they fled, are afraid to give their names in public, and still suffer severe emotional distress today. Their lawyers asked the jury to award them each at least $24m in damages.The case is the latest in a series of cases in which plaintiffs have used defamation law to push back on lies spread about them since the 2020 election. The voting equipment vendor Dominion settled with Fox for $787m earlier this year in a defamation case. Freeman and Moss also have a pending lawsuit against the Gateway Pundit, a far-right news outlet. Last year, they also settled with One America News, another far-right outlet. Civil rights groups are turning to defamation law as a new tool to ward off misinformation. More