Jury Awards $148 Million in Damages to Georgia Election Officials Defamed by Giuliani Over 2020 Vote

WASHINGTON — A jury awarded $148 million in damages on Friday to two former Georgia election officials who sued Mayor Giuliani for defamation concerning claims he made about them in 2020 that upended their lives with racist threats and harassment.The damages verdict follows emotional testimony from Wandrea “Shaye” Moss and her mother, Ruby Freeman, who tearfully described becoming the target of a conspiracy theory pushed by Mr. Giuliani and other Republicans as they tried to keep President Trump in power after he lost the 2020 election.There was an audible gasp in the courtroom upon hearing of the $75 million award in punitive damages for the women. Ms. Moss and Ms. Freeman were each awarded another roughly $36 million in other damages.Mr. Giuliani didn’t appear to show any emotion as the verdict was read after about ten hours of deliberations. Ms. Moss and Ms. Freeman hugged their attorneys after the jury left the courtroom and didn’t look at Mr. Giuliani as he left with his lawyer.Mr. 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.Mr. 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, D.C., courthouse this week.Mr. Giuliani’s lawyer acknowledged that his client was wrong but insisted that Mr. Giuliani was not fully responsible for the vitriol the women faced. The defense sought to largely pin the blame on a right-wing web site that published the surveillance video of the two women counting ballots.The judgment adds to growing financial and legal peril for Mr. Giuliani, who was among the loudest proponents of Mr. Trump’s false claims of election fraud that are now a key part of the criminal cases against the former president.Mr. Giuliani had already been showing signs of financial strain as he defends himself against costly lawsuits and investigations stemming from his representation of Mr. Trump. His lawyer suggested that the defamation case could financially ruin the former mayor, saying, “it would be the end of Mr. Giuliani.”And Mr. Giuliani is still facing his biggest test yet: fighting criminal charges in the Georgia case accusing Mr. Trump and 18 others of working to overturn the results of the 2020 election, won by President Biden, in that state. Mr. Giuliani has pleaded not guilty and characterized the case as politically motivated.Jurors in the defamation case heard recordings of Mr. Giuliani falsely accusing the election officials of sneaking in ballots in suitcases, counting ballots multiple times, and tampering with voting machines. Mr. Trump also repeated the conspiracy theories through his social media accounts. Lawyers for Ms. Moss and Ms. Freeman, who are Black, also played for jurors audio recordings of the graphic and racist threats the women received.The women’s lawyers asked for at least $24 million for each woman in defamation damages alone. They also sought compensation for their emotional harm and punitive damages.On the witness stand, Ms. Moss and Ms. Freeman described fearing for their lives as hateful messages poured in. Ms. Moss told jurors she tried to change her appearance, seldom leaves her home, and suffers from panic attacks. Her mother described strangers banging on her door and recounted fleeing her home after people came with bullhorns and the FBI told her she wasn’t safe.“It’s so scary, anytime I go somewhere, if I have to use my name,” Ms. Freeman said, gasping through her tears to get her words out. “I miss my old neighborhood because I was me, I could introduce myself. Now I don’t have a name, really.”Defense attorney Joseph Sibley told jurors they should compensate the women for what they are owed, but he urged them to “remember this is a great man.”An attorney for Ms. Moss and Ms. Freeman, in his closing argument, highlighted how Mr. Giuliani has not stopped repeating the conspiracy theory asserting the women interfered in the November 2020 presidential election. Attorney Michael Gottlieb played a video of Mr. Giuliani outside the courthouse on Monday, in which Mr. Giuliani falsely claimed the women were “engaged in changing votes.”“Mr. Giuliani has shown over and over again he will not take our client’s names out of his mouth,” Mr. Gottlieb said. “Facts will not stop him. He says he isn’t sorry and he’s telegraphing he will do this again. Believe him.”The judge overseeing the election officials’ lawsuit had already ordered Mr. Giuliani and his business entities to pay tens of thousands of dollars in attorneys’ fees. In holding Mr. Giuliani liable, the judge ruled that the former mayor gave “only lip service” to complying with his legal obligations while trying to portray himself as the victim in the case.

Jury Awards $148 Million in Damages to Georgia Election Officials Defamed by Giuliani Over 2020 Vote

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