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Rudy Giuliani’s law license has been suspended.
In a ruling handed down by the New York State Supreme Court Thursday, the state’s Attorney Grievance Committee successfully moved to have the former New York mayor’s license suspended. Specifically, Giuliani’s actions related to his defense of former President Donald Trump were to blame, according to the court.
“We conclude that there is uncontroverted evidence that respondent communicated demonstrably false and misleading statements to courts, lawmakers and the public at large in his capacity as lawyer for former President Donald J. Trump and the Trump campaign in connection with Trump’s failed effort at reelection in 2020,” the court found. “These false statements were made to improperly bolster respondent’s narrative that due to widespread voter fraud, victory in the 2020 United States presidential election was stolen from his client. We conclude that respondent’s conduct immediately threatens the public interest and warrants interim suspension from the practice of law.”
Among the violations the court cited was Giuliani’s repeated false claim of voter fraud in Pennsylvania.
From the court ruling:
Respondent repeatedly stated that in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania more absentee ballots came in during the election than were sent out before the election. The factual “proof” he claimed supported his conclusion was that although Pennsylvania sent out only 1,823,148 absentee ballots before the election, 2,589,242 million absentee ballots were then counted in the election. This factual statement regarding the number of ballots mailed out before the election was simply untrue. The true facts are that 3.08 million absentee ballots were mailed out before the general election, which more than accounted for the over 2.5 million mail-in ballots that were actually tallied.
Notwithstanding the true facts, respondent repeatedly advanced false statements that there were 600,000 to 700,000 fabricated mail-in ballots, which were never sent to voters in advance of the election.
The court noted six instances in which Giuliani repeated this claim, including on his radio show, Steve Bannon’s podcast, and in a meeting before before Michigan’s House Oversight committee.
The ruling went on to chronicle a series of other false claims continuously repeated by the former mayor. And the court even cited six different false election claims the mayor has made since the disciplinary committee moved to have him suspended. The most recent claims, made throughout March and April, were the court’s basis for suspending Giuliani’s license before the full proceedings have played out.
“Imminent threat to the public is established by this continuing pattern of respondent’s offending conduct and behavior,” the court found. “We cannot rely on respondent’s representations that he will exercise restraint while these proceedings are pending.”
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