Giuliani not currently representing Trump ‘in any legal matters,’ adviser says
Former President Donald Trump’s longtime personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, is “not currently representing President Trump in any legal matters,” senior Trump adviser Jason Miller told CNN on Tuesday.
The former New York City mayor was the face of Trump’s failed bid to overturn the presidential election results, but his legal work with the former President dates back years.
Miller said in a tweet that Giuliani remained an “ally and a friend” and is not representing Trump only because there are no pending cases in which he’s involved.
Trump had signaled frustration with Giuliani last month after he became the first president in US history to be impeached twice. He told his staff to stop paying Giuliani’s legal fees, a person familiar with the matter previously told CNN, though aides were not clear if Trump was serious about his instructions.
Now out of office and without the protections that the presidency afforded him, Trump is facing multiple criminal investigations, civil state inquiries and defamation lawsuits by two women accusing him of sexual assault.
Georgia officials have announced that the former President faces two new investigations over calls he made to election officials in an attempt to overturn the state’s election results.
And Trump faces a criminal investigation in New York, where the Manhattan district attorney’s office is looking into whether the Trump Organization violated state laws, such as insurance fraud, tax fraud or other schemes to defraud.
The scope of the investigation is broad, with prosecutors looking into, among other things, whether the Trump Organization misled financial institutions when applying for loans or violated tax laws when donating a conservation easement on its estate called Seven Springs and taking deductions on fees paid to consultants.
The former President has also privately voiced concern about whether he could face charges as a result of the January 6 US Capitol riot he’s been accused of inciting, according to multiple people.
“He’s worried about it,” one adviser close to Trump told CNN.
Though Giuliani is among Trump’s fiercest public defenders, his work on behalf of the former President has prompted legal problems of his own.
Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi filed a civil lawsuit Tuesday accusing Giuliani and Trump of conspiring with the far-right groups Proud Boys and Oath Keepers to incite the January 6 insurrection.
Giuliani, the lawsuit alleges, riled up the crowd as he told supporters: “Let’s have trial by combat.”
Additionally, Giuliani is facing lawsuits from two voting technology companies, Smartmatic and Dominion Voting Systems, related to his months-long embrace of baseless conspiracy theories about the 2020 election.
CLARIFICATION: This story’s headline has been updated to clarify that Rudy Giuliani is not currently representing the former President.
