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Republican Senator Mike Lee described Rudy Giuliani as a “walking negligence” after the riot on Capitol Hill.
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Lee sent a text message to then-national security adviser Robert O’Brien after receiving a voicemail from Giuliani intended for Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville.
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In the message, Giuliani urged Tuberville and “our Republican friends” to delay congressional certification of Biden’s victory.
Republican Sen. Mike Lee described former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani as “walking malpractice” in a late-night text message to then-national security adviser Robert O’Brien.
That’s according to the Jan. 6 select committee, which released its full 845-page report on the deadly Capitol siege Thursday night.
“You can’t make this up. I just received this voicemail. [from] Rudy Giuliani, who apparently thought he was calling Senator Tuberville,” Lee’s text read. “You have to listen to that message. Rudy is a walking malpractice.
Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama was one of several lawmakers Giuliani tried to contact before Congress resumed its joint session to certify Joe Biden’s victory following the riot on Capitol Hill.
“I’m calling because I want to discuss with you how you are trying to rush this hearing and how we need you, our Republican friends, to try to slow down so we can get these legislatures to get more information for you,” Giuliani said in the message. voice destined for Tuberville.
Lee’s text to O’Brien was buried in a note at the end of Chapter 7 of the report, titled “187 minutes of abandonment.” He texted O’Brien at 10:55 p.m. ET on Jan. 6, according to the final memo.
It’s one of dozens of times Giuliani is mentioned in the committee’s report, which paints a damning portrait of how the former New York mayor and his cronies relied on dubious conspiracy theories to try to overturn Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 elections and installing Trump for a second presidential term.
Bill Stepien, Trump’s 2020 campaign manager, told the committee he was so uncomfortable with Giuliani’s post-election antics that he locked him out of his office and told his aide not to allow the former New York mayor inside.
“I told him, don’t let anyone in,” Stepien testified. “You know, I’ll be around when I need to be around. You know, tell me what I need to know. Tell me what’s going on here, but, you know, you’ll see less of me. And sure enough, Mayor Giuliani tried to, you know, come into my office and ordered her to open the door, and she didn’t do that, she you know.”
Some of the claims Giuliani and his allies made were so outlandish that even Trump found them hard to believe.
For example, the committee report details a phone call, on November 20, 2020, between Trump and GOP-linked lawyer Sidney Powell, who worked closely with Giuliani on election litigation.
Powell launched unsubstantiated accusations of widespread voter fraud during the phone call, including a claim that voting technology company Dominion Voting Systems had colluded with Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chávez, who died in 2013, to give Biden his election victory.
According to testimony from Trump’s top communications aide Hope Hicks, the president went silent as Powell detailed these allegations during his call. Hicks testified that Trump laughed at Powell and told others in the room, “This sounds crazy, doesn’t it?”
Giuliani is currently facing possible disbarment while a Washington, D.C., ethics panel reviews his efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
His “misconduct” after the election was “so serious that it should never be allowed to happen again,” disciplinary lawyer Hamilton Fox said last week.
The DC Board of Professional Responsibility determined in a preliminary finding that Giuliani violated at least one ethics rule by filing a legal challenge in Pennsylvania seeking to throw out millions of votes in the state. The decision is not binding, and the hearing committee will consider proposals for alternative sanctions before issuing a report with a final recommendation.
Giuliani vehemently defended himself throughout the proceedings, accusing the disciplinary board of engaging in a “personal attack” without presenting adequate evidence. He also told Robert Bernius, chairman of the panel that oversaw the hearings, that Fox’s remarks were an “outrage.”
Read the original article at Business Insider