After months of racist harassment and death threats, two Black Georgia election workers got a big win Monday. A federal judge agreed to allow their defamation suit against former President Donald Trump’s election lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, to move forward, Law & Crime reports.
Wandrea "Shaye" Moss and her mother, Ruby Freeman, filed the suit in December 2021, a little more than a year after Giuliani relentlessly smeared them with allegations of altering the vote count in Georgia. Freeman and Moss offered powerful testimony in June 2022 before the Jan. 6 committee during a live hearing.
The Fulton County election workers said they were driven from their homes, threatened on social media, and left feeling afraid to go out into public. Even Moss’ grandmother was caught up in the fray, menaced by Trump supporters and the web of lies created by Trump and Giuliani.
RELATED STORY: Ruby Freeman and daughter Shaye Moss were defamed and berated. Trump, Giuliani are to blame
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Giuliani’s attorneys attempted to dismiss the suit from Moss and Freeman, of course. But in his 25-page opinion denying Giuliani’s proposed dismissal, District of Columbia Chief Judge Beryl A. Howell wrote, “Defendant Rudolph Giuliani—a current media personality and former politician once dubbed “America’s mayor”—propagated and pushed that false narrative. Caught in the crossfire of Giuliani’s campaign to undermine the legitimacy of the 2020 election were plaintiffs Ruby Freeman and Wandrea ArShaye (‘Shaye’) Moss.” He added, “As election workers across the state worked long hours carefully ensuring the accuracy of the election, the Trump Campaign and its allies, including Giuliani, engaged in a media offensive that at best questioned, and at worse condemned, their work.”
Giuliani attempted to scrap the case based on his First Amendment-protected right to free speech. Howell slammed him, writing, “Giuliani’s alleged statements accuse plaintiffs of criminal activity—which can be proven to be true or false in court—and, consequently, he cannot seek refuge under the opinion doctrine. […] Even if Giuliani made clear that his statements were his own subjective views, those statements still included accusations of election fraud that can be verified as true or false.”
Just following the 2020 election, Trump made an infamous call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. Not only did he ask him to “find” 11,780 ballots, but Trump personally attacked Moss and Freeman, mentioning Freeman’s name in particular 18 times and calling her a “professional vote scammer and hustler,” recorded audio revealed during the hearing.
Giuliani concocted a narrative that had Moss giving her mother, Freeman, “USB drives” packed with votes, “as if they were vials of heroin or cocaine,” Giuliani famously said. In reality, Moss handed her mother a “ginger mint,” she testified to the Jan. 6 committee.
One thing that didn’t come up in Freeman’s Jan. 6 House committee testimony was that in addition to the more than 850 texts, calls, and visits to her home from outraged Trump supporters, according to reporting by Reuters, Kanye West’s publicist, Trevian Kutti, paid a visit to Freeman on Jan. 4 to deliver another message: She could confess to the alleged voter fraud she was accused of, or she’d be targeted with more visits to her home and she could go to jail.
Law & Crime reports that Moss and Freeman additionally sued One American News Network (OAN) in federal court over its role in their harassment. That suit was settled out of court.
WABE reports Moss and Freeman also filed defamation suits against The Gateway Pundit, its owner Jim Hoft and his brother Joe Hoft; that suit remains pending.
Monday, Judge Howell made it clear that the case against Guiliani was moving forward. “Giuliani’s motion to dismiss is denied, and the entirety of plaintiffs’ claims may advance to discovery.”
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