Mired in bankruptcy, Rudy Giuliani suffered another financial blow on Tuesday after the New York Appellate Court disbarred him. The disbarment of New York City’s former mayor and erstwhile personal attorney of Trump came mainly for his role supporting Trump in the interference with the 2020 election.
Black New Yorkers and elsewhere, if not cheering this setback, probably have little sympathy for his predicament; many would like to see him behind bars. His most recent troubles stem from his defamation of two African American Georgia election workers—Ruby Freeman and her daughter Wandrea “Shaye” Moss—with baseless claims of fraud. They sued him for $150 million.
There was a time when Rudy was riding high after being deemed “America’s Mayor” for his presence and management of the city after 9/11. Even that conduct was not widely heralded, though, among those New Yorkers who remember his most egregious actions, particularly when he sided with off-duty police officers in 1992 in defiance of Mayor David Dinkins’s plan to make the Civilian Complaint Review Board independent of the police.
When he defeated Dinkins and became mayor, Giulani accused Rev. Sharpton, who in 1995 joined picketers outside Freddy’s Clothing Store on 125th Street, as an “outside agitator.” That was akin to his reportedly calling Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis a “ho.”
As we often say in the Black community, “What goes around, comes around,” and it’s time for Giuliani to get some comeuppance for all of his misdeeds. Perhaps this current event augurs well for the ongoing counts against the man he once represented—who he claims still owes him money.
Giuliani said he wasn’t surprised by the disbarment, nor are we. It’s not because the system is corrupt, as he charges, but because sometimes the system gets things right.