WASHINGTON (CN) — Rudy Giuliani appeared in federal court Monday to face trial over defamation charges brought by two Georgia poll workers who week damages for his baseless claims that they mishandled ballots during the 2020 election.
Giuliani, seated in the courtroom for the first time in the case’s proceedings, sat across from Ruby Freeman and her daughter, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss, who accuse Giuliani of making their names "synonymous with crime and fraud" for millions of Americans who believed the claims.
U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell in August entered a default judgment against Giuliani after he refused to comply with court orders to turn over documents. The Obama appointee said the former New York City mayor and longtime Trump attorney had made the case’s discovery process a “murky mess” and ordered him to disclose financial and business records and to pay the plaintiffs, Freeman and Moss, over $100,000 in attorneys' fees.
The only issue left for the jury to decide is the amount of damages Giuliani owes the plaintiffs, who have requested damages between $15 million and $43 million.
Von DuBose of DuBose Miller began opening statements for the plaintiffs, arguing that Giuliani destroyed his clients' names and reputations with his baseless claims of election fraud all to further a doomed effort to overturn the election.
"This case is about how Giuliani and his co-conspirators used these names as a call to action for millions of people who did not want to accept the results of the 2020 election," DuBose said.
He played clips of audio from the hundreds of threatening messages Freeman and Moss received after they were targeted. Some warned the plaintiffs to turn themselves in for treason, some threatened to burn down their homes, while others were just a slew of racial slurs.
Giuliani's attorney, Joseph Sibley IV of Camara Sibley — who was already limited in his defense due to Howell's prior ruling that his client had defamed the plaintiffs — instead argued that Giuliani's claims of election fraud snowballed out of his control once they spread online, and therefore he should not bear the full brunt of damages.
He admitted how strange it is to admit during opening statements that his client did something wrong, but urged the jury to consider whether Giuliani alone could be held responsible for damages.
"This is the civil equivalent of death," Sibley said. "If you award these damages, it will mean the end of Mr. Giuliani."
Regina Scott, a senior consultant and analyst of online threats for Jensen Hughes testified as the first witness in the case, speaking about the scope of threatening comments online that named or referred to the plaintiffs.
She testified that Freeman and Moss were mentioned online, by name, over 710,000 times between November 2021 and May 2023. Of those posts 90% came from X, formerly Twitter. The posts have continued, with approximately 630,000 referring to the plaintiffs between May 2023 and November 2023.
Scott said the type of threats Freeman and Moss received, combined with the volume of the threats, was "unprecedented" in her line of work.
Scott was the first of 11 expected witnesses for the plaintiffs, a list that includes former Trump attorneys Jenna Ellis and Ray Smith, former investigators for the Georgia Secretary of State Frances Watson and Paul Braun, and Christina Bobb, former Trump attorney and One America News Network anchor.
Smith, a former attorney for Trump’s 2020 campaign in Georgia, was the first of 19 defendants to plead guilty in Fulton County, Georgia. Ellis, an attorney for Trump’s campaign, also pleaded guilty in the case.
Giuliani will be the sole witness for the defense.
The suit centers on baseless claims Giuliani made about the plaintiffs following the 2020 election as part of a wider conspiracy to sow doubt about President Joe Biden’s electoral victory and pave the way for Donald Trump to remain in power.
While testifying before the Georgia Senate, Giuliani accused the two temporary poll workers of bringing suitcases filled with 18,000 fraudulent ballots into the State Farm Arena to swing the election in favor of Biden.
Their names were then included in broadcasts furthering Giuliani's claims on OAN; the far-right news organization that was dismissed as a defendant in the case following a settlement with the plaintiffs.
The plaintiffs, both Black women, received an onslaught of racist death threats, including one cited in the complaint that threatened to hang Moss and her 14-year-old son.
According to their initial complaint, on Jan. 6, 2021, a crowd of Trump supporters gathered outside Freeman’s home in Georgia, but she had previously relocated on FBI advice that her home would not be safe between Jan. 6 and Biden’s inauguration on Jan. 20, 2021. Freeman did not return to her home for two months.
The defamation case is only the latest chapter in Giuliani’s legal woes. He also faces disbarment in Washington, racketeering charges related to his efforts to overturn the 2020 election in Georgia and his inclusion as an unnamed co-conspirator in Trump’s Washington indictment.
Giuliani has pleaded not guilty in the Georgia case — where he faces several racketeering charges under the same act he popularized in his prosecution New York mobsters in the 80s — and has not been charged in Washington.
The jurors will hear testimony through Friday and potentially into next week before determining how much Giuliani owes the plaintiffs.
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