(ATLANTA) — A federal judge has ordered a Dec. 11 trial date to determine what damages Rudy Giuliani will have to pay two former Georgia election workers he was found liable for defaming.
Judge Beryl Howell last month found Giuliani liable for defamatory comments he made about the mother-daughter tandem of Ruby Freeman and Wandrea “Shaye” Moss.
The judge sanctioned Giuliani over erroneous remarks he made accusing the pair of fraudulently manipulating ballots on Election Day 2020 in Georgia, while Giuliani was contesting the 2020 election loss by then-President Donald Trump.
In the days after the election, Freeman and Moss became the subjects of a Trump-backed conspiracy theory that was later found to be “false and unsubstantiated,” according to an investigation by the Georgia Elections Board. Giuliani, in an appearance before a committee of the Georgia state legislature, told lawmakers that a video circulating online showed “Ruby Freeman and Shaye Freeman Moss … quite obviously surreptitiously passing around USB ports, as if they’re vials of heroin or cocaine.”
Giuliani has previously stated that he “does not contest the factual allegations” made by Freeman and Moss regarding his statements, but that his statements were “constitutionally protected.”
The former New York City mayor is already on the hook for more that $130,000 in legal fees in the case.
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