Recommendation: Disbar Rudy Giuliani

DC Bar to decide punishment for 'harming the country' with election lawsuit
By Bob Cronin,  Newser Staff
Posted Dec 15, 2022 6:00 PM CST
Rudy Giuliani Awaits Disbarment Decision
Rudy Giuliani speaks to reporters after a court hearing Monday in New York City.   (AP Photo/Michael Sisak)

Rudy Giuliani is fighting a recommendation that the former New York City mayor and lawyer for former President Donald Trump be disbarred. The disciplinary counsel's office for the DC Bar urged the punishment Thursday during a hearing, Law & Crime reports. The office announced a tentative finding that Giuliani broke ethics rules when he filed a 2020 federal lawsuit trying to prevent Pennsylvania's presidential election results from being certified. "Any lawyer that engages in this kind of misconduct, harming the country as this has done, has at least got to realize that his or her law license is at risk," said Hamilton Fox, the disciplinary counsel, per USA Today.

A judge rejected the Pennsylvania lawsuit, a federal appeals court wouldn't permit a revised complaint to be filed, per NBC News. Giuliani had defended the lawsuit last week—and his argument that the election had been stolen—during a hearing by a committee of the DC Board on Professional Responsibility, telling the panel he's being persecuted. John Leventhal, Giuliani's lawyer, urged a minor disciplinary measure be imposed instead, such as a letter of reprimand or private admonition. "Otherwise you're going to chill effective advocacy in the future," Leventhal said. Giuliani's law license in New York was suspended last year, as was his DC license. A final decision on Thursday's recommendation probably is several weeks away, per USA Today. (More Rudy Giuliani stories.)

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