Photo illustration by Thomas Levinson/The Daily Beast/Reuters
Two Georgia poll workers who have been targeted by 2020 election conspiracy theorists are picking up where the Jan. 6 congressional probe left off — by attempting to independently investigate private communications between two of the men behind the firestorm: Rudy Giuliani and former President Donald Trump.
Giuliani, who played a central role in Republicans’ attempt to overthrow the 2020 presidential election as Trump’s attorney, refused to tell congressional investigators about their conversations, citing attorney-client privilege.
But now a mother and her daughter, still reeling from the MAGA harassment, are trying to pierce through that veil.
Fulton County, Georgia’s Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss are turning their defamation lawsuit against Giuliani into a limitless investigative mission, according to an unpublished letter from their attorneys, reviewed exclusively by The Daily Beast.
Rudy Giuliani subpoenaed by federal prosecutors over Trump Records
In their Jan. 13 letter, the couple’s attorneys tell Giuliani’s defense attorney that his objections to the Jan. 6 committee’s questions about interactions with Trump are “inappropriate” and warn that they intend to use her with a to run over bulldozers.
“Mr. Giuliani, during testimony on Jan. 6, invoked privileges relating to certain issues that we expect to raise during his … testimony,” read the letter, which was written in anticipation of closed-door questioning .
Giuliani was dropped off on Wednesday in a Midtown Manhattan skyscraper that serves as the headquarters of Willkie Farr & Gallagher, the high-end international law firm representing women.
Lawyers for Freeman and Moss said they wanted to know more about Giuliani’s interactions with Trump, as well as his “correspondence” with the Justice Department regarding Trump’s mission to overturn the 2020 election, publicly telling conservative state lawmakers who were persuaded to do so doubting the election results that year, and fake Republican voters trying to band together as alternate electoral college votes to oust the real ones going for Joe Biden.
The story goes on
Lawyers also want to investigate Giuliani’s interactions with Sidney Powell, the mad attorney who ran the conspiracy-laden “Kraken” trials that spread their tentacles across the country to keep Trump in the White House. The legal ruse failed miserably, and Powell was formally sanctioned by a federal judge, who called it “an historic and profound misuse of the court process” designed to “undermine people’s confidence in our democracy.”
In the legal world, attorneys are generally given blanket protection for the interactions they have with clients. In this case, Giuliani is trying to keep secret his conversations with his client Trump as they discussed efforts to overturn the election results.
Freeman and Moss libel attorneys are trying to break through that deadlock.
“They’re trying to get at Trump,” said a source familiar with the matter.
Giuliani’s Texas attorney, Joseph D. Sibley, did not respond to requests for comment. Nor did Michael J. Gottlieb, a former Obama White House attorney in Washington who represents the mother and daughter.
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There is a strange personal drama beneath the surface of this fight. That’s because Gottlieb has an unexpected connection to Giuliani himself.
Giuliani is the primary reason for the conservatives’ fixation on President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, who has still not been prosecuted for lying about drug use in federal gun purchase papers. It was Giuliani who first obtained Hunter’s infamous discarded laptop, which contained a wealth of information about his business dealings in Ukraine and embarrassing photos of him using hard drugs. And it was Giuliani who coordinated the media coverage that has dogged Hunter Biden for years.
Gottlieb previously worked with Hunter Biden in 2014 when both were attorneys at renowned law firm Boies Schiller Flexner, where they handled deals related to Ukrainian natural gas company Burisma. Hunter Biden served on the board of Burisma Holdings until 2019, the same year Gottlieb joined the law firm Willkie Farr & Gallagher, where he now works.
In their letter, the Georgia couple’s attorneys first asked if Giuliani would appear for testimony at the Fort Lauderdale offices of Gottlieb’s former employer Boies Schiller, a move that confused Giuliani’s team, according to a source.
It’s unclear how, if at all, this tenuous link could have come about in the case.
In December 2021, Freeman and Moss first sued the company behind right-wing propaganda outlet One America News Network, its White House correspondents Chanel Rion, and Giuliani. But at this point only Giuliani remains. The former mayor and federal prosecutor of New York City tried to dismiss the lawsuit last year, but US District Court Chief Justice Beryl Howell denied it, citing “sufficient circumstantial evidence of a civil conspiracy between Giuliani and members of the Trump campaign.” at.
Freeman and Moss experienced some of the worst vitriol resulting from Trump’s refusal to step down from power after losing his bid to remain in the White House. In the weeks following the November 2020 election, the Trump campaign was desperate for evidence that would cast doubt on the results. Giuliani focused on surveillance video of the women serving as poll workers at a Fulton County vote-counting center.
Back then, Giuliani told everyone who would listen — journalists, lawmakers, and the general public — that the women were illegally moving suitcases containing fake ballots. That claim has since been thoroughly refuted by federal investigators and Georgia state election officials — who are no less Trump-supporting Republicans.
‘Tragic parody’: January 6 committee details how Trump ruined the lives of election officials
The women also appeared before the House of Representatives’ January 6 Committee, where the daughter made a heartbreaking testimony before Congress that brought tears to some in attendance as Moss described how her family was wrongly accused of fraud.
“It turned my life upside down,” Moss said. “I don’t want anyone to know my name. I don’t want to go anywhere with my mother. I don’t go to the grocery store at all. I wasn’t anywhere at all. I’ve gained about 60 pounds. I just don’t do anything anymore.”
“I don’t feel safe anywhere,” her mother told the panel Jan. 6. “You know how it feels when the President of the United States takes aim at you?”
Curiously, her current lawsuit against Giuliani may have a better chance of getting answers from the former New York City mayor than the closely-followed Jan. 6 committee.
While the panel was a well-funded and fully staffed investigation of Congress, it had one serious limitation: a tight schedule with a political deadline.
Each legal battle became a constitutional battle royale, preventing the committee from going head-to-head with the likes of Giuliani. And while resisting witnesses could be subpoenaed and taken to court, the cumbersome federal judiciary made it impossible to prosecute anyone who refused. Trump White House bureaucrat Peter Navarro has still not started his criminal case over his refusal to appear before the panel, which has since expired. And the only Witness successfully convicted of contempt of Congress, right-wing podcaster Steve Bannon, has yet to serve a day in jail.
In contrast, Freeman and Moss have no set deadline. Their attorneys can patiently litigate until a judge allows them to break this attorney-client privilege. And the judge on the case, who has already found evidence of what she called a “civil conspiracy” between Giuliani and Team Trump, could take that peek under the hood if she comes to the same conclusion as a federal judge in California last time Year: that a crime may have taken place.
The so-called crime fraud exemption is why the Jan. 6 committee was able to obtain the damning communications between conservative attorney John Eastman and Trump, showing a malicious attempt to keep him in power in 2020. Freeman and Moss aspire to the same thing.
Read more at The Daily Beast.
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