Vindication, of a Sort

Evening dispatch

Some measure of justice for Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss

In December 2023, a jury handed Shaye Moss and Ruby Freeman, the two election workers Rudolph Giuliani defamed mercilessly and whose lives he endangered, a $148 million judgment against him. Today a judge ruled that Giuliani must hand over all of his valuable assets, including his New York City penthouse, to Moss and Freeman.

Let's start with some sweet irony, shall we? Giuliani also has to turn over the $2 million in legal fees that are still owed to him by Donald Trump and his campaign. (I do not for the life of me understand why there is a lawyer left on this planet who thinks that Donald is ever going to pay his legal bills, but then again, I'm not a grifter and or a Republican.)

Here are some of the other assets Giuliani has to hand over:

• A television

• Sports Memorabilia including

  • An autographed picture of Reggie Jackson

  • An autographed Joe DiMaggio jersey

• Costume jewelry

• A diamond Ring (if it’s the pinky ring, they need to sell it asap)

• Lots of very expensive watches

• A 1980 Mercedes that once belonged to Lauren Bacall

Giuliani’s defamation of Moss and Shaye, who are mother and daughter, started when Giuliani started the vicious and baseless rumor that the two women committed voter fraud while they were counting votes in a Georgia county. That was a lie, and he knew it was a lie. The consequences to Shaye and Moss were enormous: strangers knocked on their doors at all times of the day and night; their safety was compromised; they received death threats; eventually, they had to move out of their homes.

While it’s gratifying that Giuliani is going to lose everything material thing he has, especially since so much of what he has acquired is the result of grift, it's also, hopefully, finally going to be the end of his long con, and his long-undeserved reputation.

I grew up in New York and I lived in New York when Giuliani was mayor. He has always been a vile, racist opportunist. When he was mayor, and I'm ashamed to say that he served two terms, he implemented policies, like the broken windows policy and stop and frisk, that devastated the black community and disproportionately targeted young black men.

After he left office, Giuliani probably would have become a partner at a white-shoe law firm, and we would never have heard from him again. Unfortunately for us and for the rest of the country, Giuliani was mayor during September 11^th.

Simply by virtue of his proximity to one of the most tragic events in American history, he was lionized and came to be known as “America's mayor,” which, to those of us who knew him, was offensive. He anchored a presidential campaign based solely on the worst day most of us had lived through. He constantly used September 11th as his calling card, to the point that then-democratic candidate, Joe Biden joked that “all Giuliani ever said was a noun, a verb, and 9-11.”

Since then, many people have learned just how corrupt Giuliani was during his tenure as mayor and just how complicit he was in making the city and the World Trade Center vulnerable.

Giuliani richly deserves everything that’s happening to him right now. But hopefully, he will be the first of many dominoes to fall because, let's face it, Donald Trump also defamed Moss and Freeman. Donald, Giuliani, and other Republican operatives have been on the attack against American poll workers since Donald started perpetuating the big lie back in the fall of 2020.

Let's think about that for a second. Most election workers, most poll workers volunteer their services. Why? Because they want to help make it easier for Americans to cast their votes. They do it because they believe in the democratic system. They believe in keeping our elections free and fair. These people are either non-partisan Americans or are willing to put their partisanship aside. But because of Donald and people like Giuliani and others who are willing to follow his orders, there has been an all-out assault, not just on election integrity, but on the people who ensure that our elections are carried out with integrity.

Many election workers have resigned over the last few years. It's getting harder and harder to find poll workers to volunteer because they've seen the threats election workers face with increasing regularity.

So, while it’s gratifying that Giuliani is finally facing some measure of accountability, there's so much more work to be done because he was not alone in this endeavor. We can only hope that everybody who’s helped perpetuate the big lie since 2020 is watching with increasing dread. They should be kept up nights in fear that their despicable, anti-democratic, un-American behavior, will also come under scrutiny.

It cannot end with Giuliani. We have to hope that anybody who had the abysmal judgment to hitch themselves to Donald Trump faces the same fate as the man who has done Donald’s bidding—from betraying Ukraine to trying to steal the 2020 election.

Giuliani is probably hoping that Donald, his former partner in crime, will save his ass. But, Rudy, I have some bad news for you. First of all, you are no longer of use to Donald. Secondly, remember Roy Cohn, the man who, after my grandfather, helped make Donald who he was. When Roy Cohn was dying from AIDS, Donald essentially told him to fuck off and die. And that’s exactly what Cohn did.