Georgia election workers ask court to warn Rudy Giuliani after he repeats claims judge ruled were defamatory

(CNN) — After his first day in a Washington, DC, courtroom where a jury will determine how much he owes two former Georgia election workers for defamation, former Donald Trump election attorney Rudy Giuliani still insists everything he said about the two women was true.

The federal judge overseeing the case has already ruled that Giuliani spread false information about Ruby Freeman and Wandrea “Shaye” Moss in the wake of the 2020 election.

The defamation damages trial began Monday with jury selection and opening statements, but when court ended for the day, Giuliani, a former federal prosecutor and New York City mayor, continued to attack Freeman and Moss.

“Everything I said about them is true,” Giuliani told reporters.

“Of course I don’t regret it,” Giuliani then said when asked if he regretted his actions. “I told the truth. They were engaged in changing votes.”

When a reporter responded there was no proof of such an allegation, Giuliani said: “Oh you’re damn right there is. Stay tuned.”

Freeman and Moss want the trial judge to tell Giuliani that statements such as those are out of bounds in court from him or his lawyers.

“Needless to say, were Defendant Giuliani to testify in a manner remotely resembling those comments,” the plaintiffs’ attorneys said in a court filing late Monday, “he would be in plain violation of the Court’s prior orders in this case conclusively affirming, and reaffirming, that all elements of liability have been established, including that Defendant Giuliani’s defamatory statements were false.”

The trial is putting on public display for the first time before a Washington, DC, jury the actions of Trump’s lawyers and campaign, months before the ex-president is set to go to trial in the same courthouse on criminal charges related to the 2020 election subversion effort. Giuliani’s efforts also factor into the criminal allegations Trump faces, and Trump, his legal team and campaign are legally considered co-conspirators in the defamation case.

Giuliani has already been found liable for defamation and he owes Freeman and Moss over $230,000 after failing to respond to parts of their lawsuit. The mother and daughter are now seeking tens of millions of dollars, claiming that they have suffered emotional and reputational harm as well as having their safety put in danger after Giuliani singled them out when he made false claims of ballot tampering in Georgia.

The women are asking the jury to consider awarding them between $15.5 million and $43 million for the reputational harm they’ve suffered alone from a series of specific statements Giuliani and others, including Trump and his campaign, made about them.

On top of that, they are also seeking payment for their emotional distress, attorneys’ fees and for the jury to fine Giuliani as “punishment for his outrageous conduct and to deter him and others” in the future – in what could be a staggering sum.

A verdict that ‘will send a message’

During opening statements, Von DuBose, an attorney for Freeman and Moss, showed videos and played audio clips in which Giuliani repeated false claims that the two election workers stuffed ballots and were caught on video allegedly passing a USB drive as part of a vote-stealing scheme.

None of those claims were true, and the supposed USB drive was a ginger mint. DuBose held up one of the mints on Monday for the jury to see.

But those claims led to a deluge of threats and harassment on social media, through voicemails and in person, against Moss and Freeman. DuBose played haunting voicemails the plaintiffs received in which they were called racial slurs and other insults. Some of the messages contained death threats.

“Have a nice life. What’s left of it,” one person said in an audio clip played Monday.

DuBose said those messages were just a small sample of the “hundreds and hundreds of messages” and threats Moss and Freeman received.

Giuliani’s false allegations “had the most powerful amplifier on Earth: The social media accounts of Donald J. Trump,” another attorney for the two women, Mike Gottlieb, told the jurors.

“As you hear the evidence … consider a verdict that will send a message,” Gottlieb said.

Giuliani attorney pushes for lower award amount

In his own opening statement, Giuliani attorney Joseph Sibley acknowledged that some harm was done to Freeman and Moss and that the jury would be awarding damages against his client. But he argued that the amount sought by the plaintiffs far exceeded what Giuliani should have to pay them as a result of his conduct.

Sibley said at one point that what the plaintiffs are asking for in damages is “the civil equivalent of the death penalty.”

“They’re trying to end Mr. Giuliani,” he told the jury.

“There’s really no question that these plaintiffs were harmed,” Sibley said. “They didn’t deserve what happened to them.”

But, he said, it “involved a lot of people. It wasn’t just Rudy Giuliani.”

Sibley at one point said that Freeman and Moss were asking for more in damages than what a jury awarded to actor Johnny Depp in a defamation case last year. In that matter, Depp was awarded $10 million in compensatory damages and $5 million in punitive damages in a case involving his ex-wife.

But the judge overseeing Giuliani’s case made clear she didn’t want the jury considering the facts of that case as they decided what to award Freeman and Moss.

“Mr. Sibley, let’s stick to this case,” District Judge Beryl Howell said.

Giuliani expected to testify

The former New York City mayor is expected to testify in his own defense, but his lawyer didn’t know during a hearing last week if Giuliani would invoke his Fifth Amendment rights on the stand.

On the other hand, Moss and Freeman’s team plans to show clips to the jury of other Trump campaign figures like attorney Jenna Ellis taking the Fifth when declining to answer questions at her deposition.

While Giuliani conceded in July that he did make defamatory statements about Moss and Freeman, he attempted to argue that his statements did not cause any damage to the two women and that his comments about voter fraud in Georgia in the 2020 election were protected speech.

But Giuliani lost the lawsuit in August after Howell determined that he failed to provide information sought in subpoenas.

Howell rejected down Giuliani’s complaints of being buried in litigation costs, which she called “a cloak of victimization.”

CNN has previously reported that Giuliani is struggling with the costs of the numerous legal challenges he faces related to his work for Trump following the 2020 election, and in a court filing in August, Giuliani said he’s effectively out of cash.

To ease some of the financial strain, Giuliani listed his 3-bedroom Manhattan apartment for $6.5 million, which Howell pointed out to make the case that Giuliani could pay the damages, along with a reimbursement he received from Trump and his travel on a private plane when he was processed in Fulton County in the Georgia election subversion case.

This story has been updated with additional developments.

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2023 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.