Dem
48
Ties
1
GOP
51
As readers likely know, a jury ordered Rudy Giuliani to pay two Georgia election workers he defamed $148 million. Giuliani filed for bankruptcy to try to avoid judgment day, but the ploy failed and the judge threw out the case. Now judgment day is imminent. On Friday, the two workers, Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, requested the judge to put Giuliani in receivership so they can formally seize his assets, including his condos in Manhattan and Palm Beach, his Mercedes-Benz, bank accounts, cash, jewelry and other assets. While you might at first be thinking, "Jewelry, what jewelry?," Giuliani owns three New York Yankees World Series rings. They are probably worth $20,000 to $40,000 each, maybe more at auction. He also owns over 20 valuable watches and some sports memorabilia. The total of his assets is probably not more than $10 million, though, so Freeman and Moss will never get $148 million from him. But getting $10 million and making Giuliani a pauper might be sweet after what he did to them.
The judge may decide to wait until Giuliani's appeal is heard or he could grant the request and stay it until the appeal has been decided. The judge was already made it abundantly clear that he is tired of Giuliani's stalling and refusal to cooperate, so he could also appoint a receiver and instruct him to make an inventory of Giuliani's property, seize it so Giuliani can't hide any of it, but not sell anything until the appeals have run their course.
As we have noted before, Giuliani is a defendant in criminal cases in Georgia and Arizona. If his property is seized, he may not have the money to pay a lawyer in either case and may be stuck with an inexperienced public defender who doesn't have enough time to handle such complex cases. This could put him under pressure to make a deal with the prosecutors, throwing his codefendants (who, in Georgia, include Donald Trump), under the bus in return for a light sentence. (V)