Thread by @AkivaMCohen

Rudy Giuliani, suspended (and likely soon disbarred former) attorney.

nycourts.gov/courts/ad1/cal…

Here's the TL;DR upfront: Rudy lied to courts, legislators, and the public, in his role as a lawyer.

Contrary to popular belief, lawyers are not actually allowed to do that

Rudy, right now

Important stuff from the 1st Department here. They are recognizing both that suspension here is an extraordinary remedy rarely granted - and also that Rudy's misconduct is so clear, and so uniquely dangerous to everyone that it justifies the suspension.

Sorry for the unscheduled intermission; actual client work called

The 1st Department then applies that high standard, and notes that Rudy expressly conceded that everything he said was as part of his representation of Trump.

That's important. If he was making the exact same claims in his role as a private citizen, they'd be 1A protected

That's a minor problem for Rudy, because, well, his primary defense was "I have a first amendment right to lie about this stuff"

Problem? SCOTUS has already made clear that professional restrictions on practice as a lawyer can be tighter than what the 1A allows

And that makes sense, right? I have an absolute first amendment right to call Judge John Johanneson a condescending, smarmy, scandinavian sonofabitch. (Note: If such a person actually exists I'm sure he's an excellent jurist. Don't sanction me, bro!). But ... not in court I don't

This profession is regulated and has rules of admission; when we're acting in our capacity as attorneys, that means we have to comply with those rules when they serve important interests, 1A or not.

That's why Gentile lost his case when he was disciplined for speaking at a press

conference after his client was indicted, in violation of a gag rule designed to preserve the availability of an unbiased jury; the public interest being protected was great, so the rule passed muster.

Don't lie (to the court/public) as part of representation will always pass

that level of analysis.

Sorry.

Rudy's other defense is "look, even if what I said was false, I thought it was true!"

And the Court says "yep, that would definitely be a defense"

And suspended him anyway

I am really really looking forward to reading the rest of this, not gonna lie

Rudy, Rudy, Rudy, come on now. How can you be this bad at legal strategy? You had to know "I have information, trust me, I just don't want to tell you what it is" was never going to fly, right?

Wait, right, this is Rudy. Of course he can be this bad.

Look, I'll be honest, lawyers being bad at math isn't misconduct. Though, I guess knowing that 3M is larger than 2.5M isn't technically math, and Rudy WAS capable of subtracting 1.8M (his made up number of ballots mailed out) from 2.5M. So ... ok, I can see it

Rudy admits, yeah, that wasn't true (note: bookmark this screenshot for the next time some election conspiracist cites this bonkers claim) but claims it wasn't his fault. Again, though, he submits a total of ZERO evidence in support of his explanation.

Sorry, more paying the bills and taking care of clients. Be back in a moment

Should've included this in the prior tweet. Turns out lying to the public about the election being stolen by 700K fraudulent absentee ballots, in service to a client, is a big fucking problem

Next we have Schrodinger's Fraud Claim

Y'all will remember this one. The Pennsylvania plaintiffs filed a bunch of insane claims in the federal court about how the election observers were treated. Then they amended the complaint to withdraw those claims.

And then Rudy showed up at the hearing and argued them

In a fucking terrific example of a callback joke, Rudy's defense on this appears to be "but your Honors, it was *Shrodinger's* Fraud Claim"

No, seriously: "I eventually admitted there was no fraud claim"

Hey, @questauthority, turns out the two of us are 1/1850th of one small part of the reason Rudy got suspended!

Oh.

Turns out that if you're going to lie for a client about dead people voting, and you want to preserve the ability to later claim that you thought it was true, you should really try to keep the lie *consistent*

This ... this is just ... it's art, right? @ArtDeciderV2?

I mean ...

So, count this as yet another court decision finding AS A FACTUAL MATTER that Trump's election claims are false

And I mean, you say you're not deciding Dominion's claims, but man oh man are they ever going to be quoting this decision for actual malice

Coup de grace on this one

C'mon, Rudy.

"The dog ate my due diligence" is not ever going to be a good defense, Rudy!

Bryan Geels, btw, is a random CPA and "data analytics" guy; he's not anyone who would know who registered to vote in GA, let alone who actually voted

74, 2500, it's all the same. Math, remember?

Also, you can't go around telling people "This definitely happened" when the best your "expert" can manage is "it's possible that this could have happened"

More fun with math and reality

Good God, Rudy really believed he was untouchable

Again, btw, ALL RUDY HAD TO DO to avoid this outcome was say "when I was doing my radio show, I wasn't representing a client. I was sharing my own views"

Why would he not just say that?

Next we have the Georgia "suitcases under tables" nonsense. As the court points out, it's false and Rudy knew it, because he admitted watching the whole video

But also, why is Rudy arguing that his conclusion was reasonable? The misconduct he's being charged with requires knowing falsehood. Even an unreasonable belief that the video showed misconduct would've saved him

Instead, he left that argument on the table ... and got hit with this

BTW, how many lies is that now?
1) Lying about the number of PA absentee ballots
2) Lying about Schrödinger's Fraud Claim
3) Lying about dead people voting in Philly
4) Lying about dead people voting in GA
5) Lying about felons voting in GA
6) Lying about teens voting in GA ...

7) Lying about the GA vote totals being manipulated
8) Lying about "suitcases under tables"

And we're not done?!

So this is an interesting one to me

Like, look, I'm obviously not a fan of Giuliani's. He's a stain on the profession and has no sympathy at all from me. But when someone says, in that context, "Do you think 10K illegal aliens voted ... we know they did" - he's not making a fact claim. He's making an argument

A stupid, ridiculous, unsupported argument, playing to bigotry, but an argument nonetheless. It's "come on, this must have happened, right?"

Now, maybe Rudy didn't make that point to the 1AD. But this is the one finding that seems on shaky ground. To me, anyway

Anyway, after all that, the Court points out that this isn't the full spectrum of Rudy's misconduct, and they expect to hear more when the Grievance Committee files formal charges. But it's *enough*

Um ...

Substantial. Permanent. Sanctions.

Folks, that is NOT what you want to hear from the Appellate Division on an interim order.

That's "turn in your bar card, you're done" stuff.

A model of self restraint, our Rudy is.

So yeah, discipline can't wait, because this stuff matters.

And this is just the pitch perfect ending to the decision, before the order

I spent most of November, December, and January being asked if the attorneys who were knowingly lying for President Trump & attacking our democracy would suffer any consequences.

I can't tell you how happy I am that the answer is - in at least this one case - a resounding "yes"