Rudy Giuliani is a target of the criminal investigation being led by authorities in Georgia over the Trump campaign’s efforts to overturn the state’s 2020 election results, The New York Times reported on Monday.
The former New York City mayor and atttorney to Donald Trump was one of the top pushers of bogus conspiracies about the 2020 election and appeared before several panels of state lawmakers in Georgia to demand that they decertify the results showing Joe Biden the winner. Now, his actions could make him the first Trump associate to be criminally indicted for the scheme to thwart Mr Biden from becoming president.
The Times also reported that Mr Giuliani would appear to testify before the grand jury in that probe later this week, citing a statement from Mr Giuliani’s attorney who added that his client would use attorney-client privilege to refuse comment on any conversations between him and the ex-president.
“If these people think he’s going to talk about conversations between him and President Trump, they’re delusional,” Robert Costello told the newspaper.
Once known as “America’s Mayor” during his tenure running New York City, Mr Giuliani spread numerous false theories about Donald Trump’s defeat in the weeks and months after it occurred, even while admitting to an official in Arizona that they “don’t have the evidence” to back up the Trump campaign’s claims.
His efforts to aid that scheme to overturn the election led to him asking Donald Trump, according to the sworn testimony of a White House aide, for a presidential pardon after the shocking attack on Congress which occurred on Jan 6, when thousands of people spurred on by the lies of the Trump campaign attacked the seat of US democracy.
Those choices also led to the suspension of his law licence in 2021.
The Fulton County criminal investigation is one of two probes into illegal activity by law enforcement agencies into the aftermath of the 2020 election. The other is being run at the federal level by the US Justice Department, which recently took testimony from a top aide to Mike Pence and on Monday saw the subpoena of Eric Herschmann, a former White House attorney.