- In a surprise development, Giuliani, Shaye Moss, and Ruby Freeman reached a settlement on Thursday.
- The settlement ends the four-year defamation case “once certain conditions are met.”
- Giuliani’s lawyer declined to say how a 2023 jury’s $148M award to Moss and Freeman will be met.
Rudy Giuliani and the two Georgia election workers he defamed after the 2020 election said Thursday that they have reached a new monetary settlement that satisfies both sides — and which the former New York City mayor said lets him retain “all of my personal belongings.”
The surprise settlement “will result in the satisfaction of the Plaintiffs’ judgment,” Giuliani tweeted minutes after the sides concluded a morning of back-room negotiations at a federal courthouse in Manhattan.
“I am satisfied with and have no grievances relating to the result we have reached,” Giuliani’s tweet continued. “I have been able to retain my New York coop and Florida Condominium and all of my personal belongings.”
As part of the settlement, Giuliani, 80, promised to never again defame the election workers, Wandrea “Shaye” Moss and her mother, Ruby Freeman. The two had testified that they feared for their lives when Giuliani’s false 2020 election-fraud accusations led to a barrage of racist death threats.
The former mayor and personal attorney for President-elect Donald Trump had owed the pair $148 million since December of 2023. That’s when a jury tallied up the damages from what a judge said were his “extreme and outrageous” fraud accusations.
Giuliani’s defamatory accusations included lying that the two were changing votes via flash drives and carting around thousands of fake ballots in rolling suitcases.
Giuliani attorney Joseph Cammarata declined to give further details of the settlement to reporters, saying that the parties had agreed to keep its material terms private.
“I’m not going to answer that question,” he said when asked if anyone else had paid the $148 million on Giuliani’s behalf, or if a smaller sum had been agreed to.
Cammarata also declined to say if Giuliani would get back the few items that he has so far forfeited, namely a Mercedes convertible once owned by Lauren Bacall, and a handful of luxury watches.
The agreement struck Thursday will be finalized “once certain conditions are met,” at which point it “would result in the conclusion of all litigation currently pending between and among the Parties,” according to a letter signed by both sides and filed with the court.
That litigation included civil contempt allegations brought by the mother-daughter pair, who’d alleged Giuliani was continuing to defame them.
“The past four years have been a living nightmare,” the mother-daughter pair said in a statement.
“We have fought to clear our names, restore our reputations, and prove that we did nothing wrong. Today is a major milestone in our journey. We have reached an agreement and we can now move forward with our lives. We have agreed to allow Mr. Giuliani to retain his property in exchange for compensation and his promise not to ever defame us.”
Their attorney, Aaron Nathan declined to speak to reporters.
Under Thursday’s agreement, Giuliani, who was not present for the negotiations, will keep his two most valuable possessions. His Palm Beach condo is worth $3.5 million and his Manhattan coop is worth $5.6 million, according to court papers.
Other valuables that were never turned over despite multiple court orders — and which now apparently will not be — included a signed Joe DiMaggio jersey and a cache of other Yankees memorabilia.
Andrew Giuliani was at the courthouse in Lower Manhattan on Thursday and told reporters he will get to keep three World Series rings, originally his father’s and valued at $50,000 each.
The question of who gets the rings and the Florida condo had been the subject of a mini-trial originally scheduled for Thursday before the parties instead turned to settlement negotiations.
“I’m really proud of my father,” the younger Giuliani told reporters outside the courthouse. “He’s an American hero, an American icon.”
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