Rudy goes on Fox with Carlson to
complain – surprise, surprise, surprise – report
here from Salon.com with this headline:
“Rudy
Giuliani claims feds tapped his “iCloud” in Tucker Carlson Fox interview after
raid”
Trump's former (or perhaps
current) personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani joined Fox News' Tucker
Carlson (video at the Salon link) and discussed the early-morning FBI raid
on his apartment, which quickly devolved into a Giuliani riff claiming
that the search was “completely illegal because the federal
government had somehow downloaded the former New York
mayor's data from his iCloud.”
Giuliani began the segment by
recounting the bang at 6 a.m. on (Wednesday April 28) as Federal agents
arrived with paperwork to carry out a search warrant.
He told Carlson: “I looked
at the warrant, and I said you know, this is extraordinary because I
offered to give these to the government and talk it over with them
for two years. I don't know why they have to do this.”
The New York Times reported that the feds were
apparently seeking information connected to Giuliani's role in the Trump's
dismissal of the former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Marie
Yovanovitch.
Notably, Giuliani did not mention his possible wrongdoing by communicating with Ukrainian officials ahead of the first impeachment trial of former President Trump, saying to Carlson: “The search warrant is on one single failure to file for representing a Ukrainian national or official that I never represented.”
Thus, Giuliani implied and was positioning himself as
a victim of government persecution.
He continued: “I never represented a Ukrainian national or official before the United States government. I declined it several times. I've had contracts in countries like Ukraine. In the contract is a clause that says I will not engage in lobbying or foreign representation. I don't do it because I felt it would be too compromising.”
He pushed onward in the Carlson
segment, speculating as to why FBI agents declined to take hard drives
from his apartment that were allegedly connected to Biden's son, Hunter,
saying: “I said, 'Well, don't you want these?' And they said, 'What are they?'
I said, 'Those are Hunter Biden's hard drives.' And they said, 'No, no,
no.' I said, 'Are you sure you don't want them?' The warrant required them to
take it. And they said, 'No, no, no.' One last time, I said: 'Don't you think
you should take it?' And they said no. Hunter Biden's hard drives fall
within the scope of the subpoena. The subpoena required them to take all
electronics. They decided to leave that behind!”
Rudy Gee said: “The only way you
can get a search warrant is if you can show that there is some evidence that
the person is going to destroy the evidence. Or is going to run away with the
evidence. Well, I've had it for two years and haven't destroyed it. And they
also got it from the iCloud. So, there was no — there was no justification for
that warrant! One of many that this “Department of Injustice”
tragically has done, and it breaks my heart because I belonged to the
Justice Department, and I think I had a record that is a hell of a
lot better than theirs.”
During his radio show on WABC
earlier, Giuliani described the raid on his apartment as a “disgrace,” adding:
“I've been fighting crooks all my life. I'm fighting crooks again. The only
tragedy of it is they have titles from the government. But they're a disgrace!
They are a complete disgrace to the office that I distinguished!”
Trump, it seems, remains
supportive of Giuliani, at least for now. Early in the morning,
Trump responded on Fox Business to the Giuliani raid,
calling it “unfair and motivated by a double standard with no
historical precedent.”
Trump also said: “Rudy Giuliani
is a great patriot. He does these things — he just loves this country. And they
raid his apartment? It's like, so unfair! And such a double standard like
I don't think anybody's ever seen before. It's very, very unfair.”
According to a
new from The Daily Beast, Giuliani has contacted legendary
attorney Alan Dershowitz (also serving as legal counsel to the MyPillow
CEO Mike Lindell) to enlist his advice regarding Fourth
Amendment concerns allegedly stemming from the raid.
Dershowitz to the Daily Beast said: “Search
warrants are only merited for attorneys when you have reason to believe that
the lawyer would destroy evidence.”
My 2 cents: A great article
well explained.
On that last point by
Dershowitz I wonder about this in more detail:
Since Rudy Gee had the
equipment and documents and such for over two years (as he told the FBI during the
search), and the fact that he didn’t “destroy it as he implies.”
Couldn’t that mean one of
two things: (1) He felt safe with the evidence after those two years and
decided to keep it safe, and, or (2) He wanted to keep it as insurance against
anyone who might turn against him to try to stop him from hurting them (e.g., like
Trump did when he turned against Michael Cohen, who had been closer to Trump Giuliani
for nearly 12 years as his “fixer” and personal attorney) – that is before
Cohen blew the whistle on Trump and willingly gave thousands of documents to
Federal investigators and NYS prosecutors now pursuing possible indictments
against Trump.
That makes sense to me, but we have to wait and see. This has a long way to go yet.
I suspect,
however, that Giuliani will go down hard unless he cuts a deal for a lighter
sentence and squeals on Trump, which I think is highly likely that he will do,
so stay tuned. I sure will.
Thanks for stopping by.
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