(NEW YORK) — Former President Donald Trump’s one-time personal attorney Rudy Giuliani won’t contest that he made “false” statements about two Georgia election workers in the aftermath of the 2020 election.
The mother-daughter tandem of Ruby Freeman and Wandrea “Shaye” Moss are suing Giuliani for defamation, follow remarks he made accusing the pair of fraudulently manipulating ballots on Election Day in Fulton County, Georgia.
In a court filing on Tuesday, Giuliani stated that he “does not contest the factual allegations” made by Freeman and Moss regarding his statements, but that his statements were “constitutionally protected.”
Giuliani said in the filing that he won’t contest their claim that he falsely accused the election workers of manipulating ballots, in order to “avoid unnecessary expenses in litigating what he believes to be unnecessary disputes.”
As a result of the concession, there’s no need for “any additional discovery or sanctions” in the case, Giuliani said in the filing.
“Mayor Rudy Giuliani did not acknowledge that the statements were false, but did not contest it in order to move on to the portion of the case that will permit a motion to dismiss,” Giuliani’s adviser, Ted Goodman, told ABC News in a statement.
“This is a legal issue, not a factual issue,” Goodman said. “Those out to smear the mayor are ignoring the fact that this stipulation is designed to get to the legal issues of the case.”
In the days after the election, Freeman and Moss became the subjects of a Trump-backed conspiracy theory that was later found to be “false and unsubstantiated,” according to an investigation by the Georgia Elections Board. Giuliani, in an appearance before a committee of the Georgia state legislature, told lawmakers that a video circulating online showed “Ruby Freeman and Shaye Freeman Moss … quite obviously surreptitiously passing around USB ports, as if they’re vials of heroin or cocaine.”
Last year Freeman told ABC News’ Terry Moran that she subsequently received so much harassment from conspiracy theorists that for a time she was forced to leave the suburban Atlanta home where she had lived for 20 years. The pair gave similar testimony when they appeared before the House selection committee investigating the events of Jan. 6.
The investigation by the Georgia Elections Board cleared Moss and Freeman of all wrongdoing last month.
“This serves as further evidence that Ms. Freeman and Ms. Moss — while doing their patriotic duty and serving their community — were simply collateral damage in a coordinated effort to undermine the results of the 2020 presidential election,” the attorney representing Freeman and Moss said in a statement following the release of the elections board’s report.
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