Giuliani files for bankruptcy after defamation case
Rudy Giuliani has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in New York, one day after a federal judge ruled that he must immediately pay the US$148 million (NZ$235 million) he owes two Georgia women he falsely accused of helping to steal the 2020 election.
In paperwork filed yesterday to seek protection from New York creditors, Giuliani listed nearly US$500 million in debts, including the US$148 million he owes former Georgia election workers Ruby Freeman and Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss. He also listed unknown amounts of debt to election technology companies Smartmatic and Dominion Voting Systems, which named the former New York mayor in their defamation lawsuits about the 2020 presidential election. He listed his assets at more than US$1 million but less than US$10 million. “The filing should be a surprise to no one,” Ted Goodman, a political adviser to Giuliani, said in a statement. “No person could have reasonably believed that Mayor Rudy Giuliani would be able to pay such a high punitive amount.”
Goodman said the Chapter 11 filing would afford Giuliani “the opportunity and time to pursue an appeal, while providing transparency for his finances under the supervision of the bankruptcy court, to ensure all creditors are treated equally and fairly throughout the process.”
The bankruptcy filing comes the day after the judge overseeing Giuliani's defamation case in Washington ordered him to immediately pay the US$148 million he owes Freeman and Moss. Judge Beryl A. Howell wrote that there was a strong danger Giuliani is likely to hide his assets from the women, who had asked a jury at trial to award them roughly US$47 million in damages for the racist attacks and abuse they received after Giuliani spread the debunked information about them.
Attorneys for Freeman and Moss still have to enforce the judgment against Giuliani, which may involve further court proceedings. But they do not have to wait the standard 30 days to begin trying to seize his assets.
“This manoeuvrer is unsurprising, and it will not succeed in discharging Mr Giuliani's debt to Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss,” Freeman and Moss's attorney Michael Gottlieb said in a statement after Giuliani's filing for bankruptcy.
Giuliani talked about filing for bankruptcy on his radio show yesterday.
“I believe it was the responsible and only thing to do,” Giuliani said on his radio show. “I do not have the money to pay a $148 million verdict.” He also said, “Without that, I am not bankrupt.”
“I have probably something like $10, $11 million in assets,” Giuliani went on to say. “I have probably about $1 million in debt, which means I'm up $9, $10 million.”
Legal analysts say going bankrupt wouldn't get Giuliani out of paying the women. On the night the jury returned its verdict against Giuliani, the former US attorney for the Eastern District of Michigan Barbara McQuade said on MSNBC that debts for defamation and intentional infliction of emotional distress cannot be eliminated through bankruptcy.
However, he could attempt to re-litigate whether his conduct was, in the words of bankruptcy law, “willful and malicious.” Such a fight would take place before a bankruptcy judge and could allow Giuliani to delay payment or negotiate a post-verdict settlement, experts said before Howell ordered that Giuliani pay the women immediately.