Rudy Giuliani indicted in Georgia over alleged scheme to overturn electoral votes

Rudy Giuliani, who was once hailed as “America’s mayor” as he led New York City through the 2001 terrorist attacks, has been indicted in what prosecutors say was a scheme to overturn the 2020 electoral votes in Georgia in favor of former President Donald Trump.

The indictment accuses Giuliani of being part of a band of Trump supporters who “knowingly and willfully joined a conspiracy to unlawfully change the outcome of the election in favor of Trump” by overturning votes by Georgia electors for Democrat Joseph Biden. Trump had depended on winning Georgia’s electoral vote in 2020 as part of his strategy to remain in the White House.

“This is an affront to American democracy,” Giuliani said in a statement released Tuesday. He said the indictment “does permanent, irrevocable harm to our justice system. It's just the next chapter in a book of lies with the purpose of framing President Donald Trump and anyone willing to take on the ruling regime.”

The indictment states that Giuliani, Trump and others indicted in the case “refused to accept that Trump lost the election.”

“Giuliani’s indictment on racketeering charges in Georgia for trying to overturn the 2020 presidential election results in favor of Donald Trump fundamentally changes the former New York City mayor’s legacy in American politics,” said Meena Bose, director of the Kalikow Center for the Study of the American President at Hofstra University. “His reputation as a tough-on-crime public official who prosecuted Mafia members with racketeering charges, enforced strict, and contentious, law-and-order measures in New York City, and demonstrated resolute leadership after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, will be permanently overshadowed by his admittedly false charges of election fraud in Georgia in the 2020 presidential race.”

Giuliani had built a historic career in New York. In the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Manhattan from 1981 through 1989, he made international headlines with cases against organized crime. He became New York City mayor in 1994 and was credited with reinvigorating the city by cracking down on crime and strip clubs in Times Square. But he was also criticized for those policies, some of which courts determined violated civil rights. In 2000 he ran against then-First Lady Hillary Clinton for U.S. Senate, but withdrew when he was diagnosed with cancer.

In 2001, his last year as mayor, he helped bolster a distraught nation in the aftermath of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. He ran for president in 2008, but lost the GOP nomination to Sen. John McCain, who eventually lost to Democrat Barack Obama. After running his own security firm, Giuliani began advising and representing Trump in 2018.

Giuliani is charged with several counts in the Georgia indictment.

He is accused of making false statements and “solicitations” of state legislators “to persuade Georgia legislators to reject lawful electoral votes cast by the duly elected and qualified presidential electors from Georgia.” He also is accused of having “corruptly solicited Georgia legislators” to replace electors to the Electoral College with those who would choose Trump over Biden, who won the popular and electoral vote for president in 2020 by wide margins.

Other counts against Giuliani include:

• Making false statements to the Georgia governor, secretary of state who oversaw elections, and other elected officials “to violate their oaths to the Georgia Constitution and to the United States Constitution by unlawfully changing the outcome” of the election for Trump.
• Creating “false electoral documents” to “disrupt and delay the joint session of Congress on January 6, 2021,” the day of the attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump supporters. The federal indictment said “similar schemes” were conducted in Michigan, Nevada, New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
• Trying to get Vice President Mike Pence to “violate the United States Constitution and federal law by unlawfully rejecting Electoral College votes cast” in Georgia. Pence was pressured by Trump and threatened by Trump supporters to refuse to certify the Electoral College win for Biden.
• Illegally accessing secure voting equipment and voter data to further their scheme, including stealing data, ballot images, voting equipment and software and personal information of voters.
• First-degree forgery by creating a document that purports to have been made by the authority of duly elected and qualified presidential electors from the state of Georgia and delivering the forged document to the U.S. archivist, which was a step in the Electoral College’s vote.
• Several counts of conspiracy to commit false statements and conspiracy to file a false document regarding the selection of electors.
• Making false statements to Georgia state senators that “election workers fraudulently counted certain ballots as many as five times” at one polling site; that 2,560 felons voted illegally; at 10,315 votes were cast in the name of dead people.

By Michael Gormley

michael.gormley@newsday.com@GormleyAlbany

Michael Gormley has worked for Newsday since 2013, covering state government, politics and issues. He has covered Albany since 2001.