Let's talk more about that.
Rudy Giuliani being
criminally charged in Georgia
isn't the only trouble
that is facing
Giuliani, Trump's former attorney.
CNN has now learned that
even before this indictment,
Giuliani is staring down
hundreds of thousands of dollars
in legal bills
and more related to his work
for Donald Trump after the 2020 election.
Still, Giuliani
isn't shying away from attacking the D.A.
in Georgia, who he'll soon see in court
She's a politician
and not a lawyer,
not an honest, honorable lawyer.
This is a ridiculous application
The racketeering statute,
there's probably no one that knows it
better than I do.
This is not meant for election disputes.
I mean, this is ridiculous
what she's doing.
Also, I don't know if she realizes it
because she seemed like
a pretty incompetent, sloppy prosecutor.
Let's get over to CNN's Caitlin Poland.
Caitlin, tell us more about this
reporting that you've uncovered
about what the current state of Rudy
Giuliani's financial situation is.
Rudy Giuliani doesn't even have the money
to respond
to some of the demands
that are being made upon him
as these lawsuits
related to the 2020
election move forward.
So we saw some court filings this week.
There's even a hearing happening
right now
in New York in the defamation case
that Smartmatic,
the voting machine company,
had filed against Giuliani
for making
false statements about them
and the 20, 20 election.
And in that case,
he has all of his electronic records held
by an archiving company,
a data holder called Trust Point.
And that company
needs to have him pay for searches
so that he can turn over
his records in these lawsuits
not just the Smartmatic lawsuit
but in others.
And in this court filing on Monday
he doesn't have $15,000
or somewhere between 15,020 $3,000
to pay them to run the search
he needed to run.
He also doesn't have the money to keep
his electronic records
hosted by this company.
They charge about $20,000 a month
every month
to keep his records
active and alive
so that he can use them in these lawsuits
to defend himself.
On top of that, he has other bills.
He just had a court order recently
where he has to pay
cell phone bills that went unpaid in 2020
related to his company.
That is not a small amount either.
And then there is also
on top of that bills
that he has to pay for sanctions
for other people's
legal fees where he hasn't responded
appropriately in these 2020
election lawsuits.
So it is a lot of money that he has to
pay now.
And that's just the start
if he were to lose these lawsuits
and also those criminal cases
that cost money to defend as well.
Yeah I mean
$57,000 and phone bills
that have gone on paid
I mean that you're right.
That is no small amount
that that's just one little element
of what he's up against.
Great to see you
Caitlin great reporting thank you, sir.
Joining us
now, Nick Ackerman,
former assistant special
Watergate prosecutor
and former assistant U.S.
attorney for the Southern District
of New York.
I'm going to start with this.
And then we will also get to Giuliani.
Why is Mark Meadows
trying to move the case
from state court to federal court?
Well, I think the reason for doing
that is to try and get it out
of completely a Fulton County jury
so that they have a broader
jury to pick from
That would include
a lot more conservative
Republicans from rural areas.
I think that's the primary reason
to do it.
The reason,
Mark Meadows,
I think, is a very strategic decision
among the defendants
of all of the defendants.
He probably would on the surface
seem to have the best chance to do this
because he was basically
a gofer for Donald Trump.
So the question is going to be,
when he goes before
and files this in federal court,
whether he was acting within the scope
of his duties as Donald Trump's
main person,
as his
as his know,
secretary of state or whatever it is.
I mean, he was the guy
who was supposed to be running that.
And I think what the prosecutors will do
will come back with very hard evidence
showing that Mark Meadows
actually committed crimes.
And that will do it
because the standard here is
whether or not
he was acting in the scope of his duties
as chief of staff for Donald Trump.
And certainly
one of those duties
is not committing crimes.
So next time is not within his duties.
In fact,
this is the same thing
that Judge
Hellerstein denied Donald Trump
in the New York case.
Nick, I want to ask you about that,
because there are a host of Republicans
making arguments
that the state court should not be able
to try a former president.
But Trump is a private
citizen, as is Mark Meadows.
So is this a political argument
that we're seeing play out,
or is this an actual legal argument that
holds water
Oh, no, it's an actual legal argument.
There is a statute
that permits government officials
to remove cases to the federal court.
But there's a standard to be met.
And the standard is whether or not
the actions that are being complained of
or in the course
of his normal duties
in that official capacity.
And that's where Mark Meadows
is going to fall short.
It's where Donald Trump fell short before
Judge Hellerstein in New York,
who found that paying money to a
hush money to a porn star
and covering it up
by falsifying business records was not
within the scope of the duties
of the president of the United States.
I think the same decision,
the same decision
is going to be precedent
here for the federal court
to do the exact same thing and deny it.
But basically,
Mark Meadows
is the stalking horse
for the other defendants in the case.
To see if he gets it done,
then they might follow suit.
Nick Ackerman,
thank you so much for all of that.
And very interesting to note
what happened in the state case
in New York.
You're saying that
same kind of precedent
may be set
to keep the state case in Georgia
from going to the federal courts.
Appreciate you.