Say Her Name: The Story of Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss’ Vindication

After a jury awarded Ruby Freeman and her daughter $148 million for the intentional lies the former president’s former lawyer told about them in an attempt to steal an election, this is some of what Freeman had to say:

Good evening everyone. I am Lady Ruby. Today’s a good day. A jury stood witness to what Rudy Giuliani did to me and my daughter and held him accountable. And for that I’m thankful. Today is not the end of the road. We still have work to do. Rudy Giuliani was not the only one who spread lies about us, and others must be held accountable too. But that is tomorrow’s work. For now, I want people to understand this. Money will never solve all of my problems. I can never move back to the house that I called home. I will always have to be careful about where I go and who I choose to share my name with. I miss my home, I miss my neighbors, and I miss my name.

Freeman’s daughter, Shaye Moss, said this:

As we move forward, and continue to seek justice, our greatest wish is that no one — no election worker, or voter, or school board member, or anyone else — ever experiences anything like what we went through. You all matter and you are all important. We hope no one ever has to fight so hard just to get your name back.

For the women — vindicated by a jury of their peers, Rudy Giuliani’s peers, doing their civic duty — winning this substantial recognition of the damage done to them was about getting their name back.

The comments from the women said so much about the damage that Trump and Rudy’s bullying have done to the nation’s civic fiber.

But that’s not what led the coverage of their victory.

Rudy did.

Here’s how WaPo covered it.

WaPo first named Freeman and Moss in ¶3 of the story. The entire story quotes just 23 of their collective words after the verdict (though quotes or describes their testimony at more length, starting 24¶¶ into the story, after repeating Rudy’s false accusations about the women and the debunking presented at trial.

The damages verdict came in a defamation lawsuit filed against Giuliani, 79, by Fulton County, Ga., election workers Ruby Freeman and Wandrea ArShaye “Shaye” Moss, whom Trump and others on the former president’s campaign and legal teams falsely accused of manipulating the absentee ballot count in Atlanta.

“Today is a good day,” Freeman said, standing outside the courthouse with Moss after a jury awarded the mother and daughter pair $75 million in punitive and $73 million in compensatory damages for defamation and emotional distress.

[snip]

Their attorneys in closing arguments had urged jurors to “send a message” to Giuliani and others in public life that the “facts matter.” On Friday Moss added, “Giuliani was not the only one who spread lies about us, and others must be held accountable, too.”

By comparison, WaPo cited 58 words from Rudy’s post-verdict comments, with pushback on his claims that he hadn’t had a chance to present a case, but not on his comment that if the 2020 election weren’t exposed we wouldn’t have a country anymore.

Though the story described the verdict as a “potentially worrying sign for him as he faces criminal charges in Georgia accusing him of related efforts to overturn Biden’s victory there,” it didn’t talk about how some of the evidence Rudy withheld in discovery might have made that plight worse.

Here’s how Politico covered it (placed on the front page behind a 1,250-word story purporting to describe how impeachment will work, without mentioning there’s no evidence of wrongdoing).

Politico got the names of Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss in the subhead and the second paragraph.

Politico sandwiched some of Freeman’s comments, 47 quoted words in ¶19, in-between two paragraphs — starting at ¶9 and in ¶24– quoting 49 words of Rudy’s comments.

A few minutes later, Giuliani stood outside the courthouse and declared, “I don’t regret a damn thing.”

The former mayor and federal prosecutor called the monetary award “absurd” and said he would appeal. He denied responsibility for the threats and harassment that Freeman and Moss received — including a bevy of unambiguously racist, violent messages — and said that he receives “comments like that every day.”

[snip]

“Today’s a good day. A jury stood witness to what Rudy Giuliani did to me and my daughter — and held him accountable,” Freeman told reporters after the verdict was delivered. “We still have work to do. Rudy Giuliani was not the only one who spread lies about us, and others must be held accountable, too,” she said, without elaborating.

[snip]

But after the verdict on Friday, Giuliani offered a different reason for declining to take the stand: “I believe the judge was threatening me with the strong possibility that I’d be held in contempt or that I’d even be put in jail,” he said.

Giuliani didn’t repeat his false claims about Freeman and Moss Friday, but continued to air false claims that the 2020 election was stolen. “My country had a president imposed on it by fraud,” he declared.

Rather than mentioning Moss’ tribute to other civil servants, Politico focused closely on tensions between Rudy and his attorney, Joe Sibley.

Even though the reporters on this story, Kyle Cheney and Josh Gerstein, provide some of the best coverage of all things January 6, the story didn’t mention that by blowing off discovery in this case, Rudy may have tried to keep evidence hidden from Jack Smith.

Like the other outlets, NYT’s story led with an image of Rudy.

But it focused paragraphs two through four on the women.

Judge Beryl A. Howell of the Federal District Court in Washington had already ruled that Mr. Giuliani had defamed the two workers, Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss. The jury had been asked to decide only on the amount of the damages.

The jury awarded Ms. Freeman and Ms. Moss a combined $75 million in punitive damages. It also ordered Mr. Giuliani to pay compensatory damages of $16.2 million to Ms. Freeman and $16.9 million to Ms. Moss, as well as $20 million to each of them for emotional suffering.

“Today’s a good day,” Ms. Freeman told reporters after the jury delivered its determination. But she added that no amount of money would give her and her daughter back what they lost in the abuse they suffered after Mr. Giuliani falsely accused them of manipulating the vote count.

Because of that early focus, the dead tree version of today’s paper got Freeman’s name — and her declaration that it was a good day — on page A1 three times.

It closed with Freeman’s promise of more.

“Our greatest wish is that no election worker or voter or school board member or anyone else ever experiences anything like what we went through,” she said.

And while this is a an artificial measure, this NYT story also managed to quote more of Freeman’s speech — 31 words — than Rudy’s — 28. While it quoted Rudy attacking the verdict and standing by his lies, it did not repeat his other lies.

As with all the others, this story didn’t consider whether Rudy was protecting himself criminally by withholding related information in discovery.

I get that these measures are totally artificial. I mean this as observation, not criticism.

I get that Rudy is the famous one, Rudy makes this a tale of downfall. Even bmaz made this about Rudy, not the women who faced him down, Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss.

But I was really really struck by how, even in their vindication, the heroism of what these women did, the heroism of election workers refusing to be bullied, still wasn’t the focus.

image_print
82 replies
  1. EW Moderation Team says:

    A reminder to all new and existing community members participating in comments:
    — We have been moving to a new minimum standard to support community security over the last year. Usernames should be unique and a minimum of a minimum of 8 letters.

    — We do not require a valid, working email, but you must use the same email address each time you publish a comment here. **Single use disposable email addresses do not meet this standard.**

    — If you have been commenting here but have less than 1000 comments published and been participating less than 10 years as of last October 2022, you must update your username to match the new standard.

    Thank you.

  2. wasD4v1d says:

    In the first report in WaPo about the award, the women were pictured above the fold. Rudy has larger implications, and his fall from grace is of mythic scale. The Rudy story is reaching the epilogue, but we may hear more yet from the Freemans – or gaze in awe at the statuary that will memorialize them for centuries hence.

    • emptywheel says:

      Oh. I just looked at what was on the front page today. Thanks for noting that it focused on the women earlier.

      • BobBobCon says:

        The stovepiping at the editorial level is a legitimate issue, I would note.

        With Covid reporting there was a significant problem where political desk editors felt it was fine to treat antivax rhetoric as if it was just any other controversy like wearing flag pins, and they would leave all consideration of illness and death to the health section reporters.

        Political desks find their jobs to be much easier if they can pretend it’s all a game. Editorial stovepiping is one of the techniques that enables that attitude, and it’s a particular problem when one side of an issue is not only separated but marginalized.

        • wasD4v1d says:

          Well said. There are two stories here, but WaPo et all think only the Giuliani angle has legs: Still, the Freemans are the heroines who will get statues, which is more durable than newsprint. And I hope their dose of heroism is itself just as durable for the body politick.

      • wasD4v1d says:

        As you point out, the focus on the Freemans didn’t last near long enough, but NY Magazine – where Rudy was somehow the nation’s mayor – is featuring the Freemans.

  3. Yogarhythms says:

    Ew,
    Reporting truth to power with evidence has never been more important. Thank you Dr Wheeler for championing the courage of the plaintiffs. Women, election workers, from the great state of GA. Unbowed by relentless ongoing alleged RICO criminality, personal attacks, on both women, stood up for justice proudly addressing the public on camera celebrating their jury’s verdict. Rudy and other MAGA’s also appeared unbowed on camera. FAFO has a delayed retribution. When you hit rock bottom, like a light bulb, self transcendence, illuminates the pathway ahead. Darkness is a sycophant’s only friend.

    • bmaz says:

      “…relentless ongoing alleged RICO criminality”.

      What a crock of shit. In nowhere but Fulton County would it ever constitute “RICO”.

      • CZSommers says:

        Fulton County, and Fani Willis are following their state law(s) in the RICO prosecutions of Trump and his cabal. It really doesn’t matter that Georgia RICO law doesn’t totally align with other states’ RICO laws. You’ve made it abundantly clear that you disagree with this. Why does this bother you so much? They are following the law.

        • bmaz says:

          Because I have spent most of my life, and all of my career, caring about the criminal justice system and practicing in it. Also, too, I loathe abusive prosecution and abuse of prosecutorial discretion. If you don’t like that, go somewhere else.

          By the way, Georgia’s RICO law is not much different than the federal one, or that of other states, just much easier to abuse because of the tentacles of it. If you had a clue, you would know that. Thanks for your first time comment.

      • commonphoole says:

        Bmaz u upset about the way the RICO law is being used in Georgia or who it is being used against? It was used against teachers and Hip hop musicians. Would you object to that?

  4. JusticeofthePeace says:

    I have been a participant in our town’s vote-counting for more than forty years. I have been moved every time by the seriousness with which all sorts of different people — different political parties, different religious beliefs, different classes, different family and educational backgrounds — have approached the counting of ballots. We appreciate the care with which the system we use has been designed to assure fairness and to avoid even accidental error. The process is both exacting and deeply stirring.

    When I watched the testimony of Shaye Moss and Ruby Freeman before the January 6th committee, I was moved to tears by what these two good citizens had experienced on behalf of all of us. That the disgusting bully who initiated the attacks on them could emerge from this trial to say, “I don’t regret a damn thing,” before sliding into his stretch limousine made me wish that this creep (he was never my America’s mayor) might spend the rest of his dismal days in a shelter with other homeless people. And if Dante’s hell exists, may he find his proper place in Satan’s anus.

    The quiet dignity of their comments, in contrast, made me proud to be their fellow citizen.

    [Thanks for updating your username to meet the 8 letter minimum. At least I assume this is what you have done since you have previously published comments here as “THW,” “T. Wilson,” and possibly as “letsbegin” (same address used). /~Rayne]

    • RipNoLonger says:

      So nicely stated. I think you said how many feel – and probably most of the educated readers of outlets such as this.

    • rosalind says:

      for years my voting precinct was in the heart of hollywood (CA), where i could always count on hearing a range of accents from the poll workers proudly ensuring our voting day went smoothly. they were so damned proud of achieving citizenship and getting to participate in our democracy. i always came away reminding myself to appreciate what this Country has achieved. now, alas, the voting day brings mostly anxiety…

      • Peterr says:

        I was browsing some antique shops yesterday, and came across some old cloth bags marked “counted votes” and the name of the county, with space for writing in the specific precinct (filled in on the bags). It harks back to counting paper ballots, and keeping track of which were counted already, and which were yet to be counted.

        Those old bags made the quote Marcy lifted up even more powerful today:

        “Our greatest wish is that no election worker or voter or school board member or anyone else ever experiences anything like what we went through,” she said.

        Between seeing these old ballot bags and thinking of the local school board members I work with a lot — a very mixed bag of folks, politically speaking — these words gave me goosebumps.

        I’d love to see these words posted in every county clerk’s office in every state in the union.

        • RipNoLonger says:

          That’s powerful. Touching a bit of history and reality like that can make us viscerally realize how we got where we are. Thanks.

        • Ginevra diBenci says:

          I hope you purchased those paper ballot bags, Peterr. From what I read this morning, it seems like you might be able to resell them for a nice profit to Roseanne Barr. Her declared preference for paper ballots was among the only coherent moments from her TPUSA “speech” attacking…well, Stalinists, I guess.

    • LaMissy! says:

      I agree with the nobility of the sentiments expressed so eloquently by Moss and Freeman.

      The un-housed in our country have enough problems, though, without wishing for Giuliani to take up space among them. A jail cell for Rudy, though at our public expense, is a thing I’d support.

  5. Tony Daniel says:

    When and if Rudy wakes up from this alcohol self induced nightmare, he may just take the gun an leave the canoli.

  6. Matt Foley says:

    I felt sick in the stomach watching them describe what they’ve been through.

    “Our greatest wish is that no election worker or voter or school board member or anyone else ever experiences anything like what we went through,” she said.

    I wish it, too, but I’m afraid it’s only going to get worse. Now the MAGAs are destroying religious statues they don’t like. Michael Cassidy destroyed Satanic Temple statue in Iowa Capitol then went on Fox to brag about his crime and play the victim because his feelings were hurt by religious freedom. DeSantis defends him and pledges to donate to his defense fund.

    There’s no hate like MAGA Christian love.

    • Fraud Guy says:

      Unfortunately, a good recapitulation of early Christian treatment of other religious sites once they became ensconced in the Roman Imperial system.

    • loretta whelpton says:

      DeSantis has also pledged $1million of Florida taxpayer money to sue the College Football Playoff committee for not giving Florida State University a suitable bowl game. How’s *that* for a corrupt, racketeering executive? Georgia’s RICO madness must be migrating south.

    • bbuckrah says:

      DeSantis has also pledged $1million of Florida taxpayer money to sue the College Football Playoff committee for not giving Florida State University what he deems a suitable bowl game. How’s *that* for a corrupt, racketeering executive? Georgia’s RICO madness must be migrating south.

  7. earlofhuntingdon says:

    “Potentially worrying sign” for Rudy G. and his financial well-being? American newspapers are not known for their understatement, which, in this case, serves to bolster Rudy by underplaying that he’s about to hit the bottom of the barrel.

    He seems unlikely to be able to pay even the usual 10% bond needed to appeal, or admit he could pay it, if he’s been hiding assets. The coming reviews of his financial transactions might make an endoscopy seem like an easy bike ride. His credibility, his finances, and his ability to raise revenue are toast, with no obvious way to recover them.

    • Frank Probst says:

      I’ve heard the “10% bond” thing several times and don’t quite understand it. Can someone summarize it in non-lawyer speak? What it sounds like is that Rudy will need to give the court $15 million in order to be able to appeal this decision. I’m not a Rudy fan by any means, but sounds like bad law to me. Defendants should have a right to appeal. They shouldn’t have to have more than $10 million on hand to exercise that right.

      • bmaz says:

        Frank, that mostly comes from criminal cases where bail bond agents take 10% fee for issuing a bond. But that assumes you or your family has sufficient collateral for the full amount. In civil cases, it can generally be waived by the court, but it also can be used to discourage frivolous appeals.

      • earlofhuntingdon says:

        It’s complicated. Every loser wants to delay paying a big judgment. That’s the normal insurance company business model, for example. Some jurisdictions, but not all, require substantial bonds, to make it harder to use the appeals process just to delay, rather than owing to a good faith belief that the defendant might win his appeal. One important reason is that delay can often make a judgment uncollectable, or lower the chances of collecting a reasonable portion of it.

        Here, Rudy seems likely to need to post a bond for the full amount of the judgment. The cost is commonly 10% of the face amount, in cash or some liquid asset. As bmaz noted, the bond issuer can demand more, depending on the creditworthiness of the defendant. Rudy’s credit must be in the tank.

        The court can vary it, but Rudy has guaranteed the equities are not in his favor. He thumbed his nose at the court and defendants by not complying with mandatory discovery, and offered no defense, while making out of court statements, not under oath, that he has voluminous proof for his claims. He has continued to defame the plaintiffs with unrepentant tirades. His conduct lowers the odds his appeal would be successful. Consequently, he isn’t likely to persuade the court to give him a break.

        • theartistvvv says:

          I wanna note something that I find important but seems to be overlooked is that he has failed to make any payment regarding the not insubstantial sanctions – including attorney fees – ordered against him from before trial.

  8. bmaz says:

    Huh, so DC residents are Freeman and Moss’ peers? Not jurors in GA? Maybe DOJ should have kept their cases in DC too. Who couldda knowd?

    • emptywheel says:

      bmaz

      We are familiar with the fact that you’re so angry that Georgia is enforcing AMONG OTHER THINGS their hacking laws AND ALSO the RICO laws that are there on the books in GA that you like to obscure all the details about the differences in the cases. No need to brag about it.

      • bmaz says:

        Yeah, I will stay where I am, thanks. And I referenced DOJ, i.e. Garland and Smith, not the local yokel in Fulton County. Also, too, every jurisdiction has RICO laws, not just Fulton County. Only Fulton County uses them so abusively. I think that is worth consistently pointing out.

        • Super Nintendo Chalmers says:

          IF what you say is 100% accurate and not clouded by your bias then it should have been very easy to get these cases dismissed. That has not been the case to date.

        • bmaz says:

          That is complete bullshit. But hey, what do I know after a lifetime doing this.

          And, by the way, my “bias” is in favor of ethical and appropriate prosecutorial discretion. Is that the “bias” you are talking about?

        • Oakland Mole says:

          Bmaz’s sensitivity to the problem of prosecutorial discretion is warranted, and it reminds me of former US Attorney General Robert Jackson’s warning to US Attorneys in 1940 (https://www.roberthjackson.org/speech-and-writing/the-federal-prosecutor/):

          “If the prosecutor is obliged to choose his cases, it follows that he can choose his defendants. Therein is the most dangerous power of the prosecutor: that he will pick people that he thinks he should get, rather than pick cases that need to be prosecuted.

          “With the law books filled with a great assortment of crimes, a prosecutor stands a fair chance of finding at least a technical violation of some act on the part of almost anyone. In such a case, it is not a question of discovering the commission of a crime and then looking for the man who has committed it, it is a question of picking the man and then searching the law books, or putting investigators to work, to pin some offense on him.

          “It is in this realm-in which the prosecutor picks some person whom he dislikes or desires to embarrass, or selects some group of unpopular persons and then looks for an offense, that the greatest danger of abuse of prosecuting power lies.

          “It is here that law enforcement becomes personal, and the real crime becomes that of being unpopular with the predominant or governing group, being attached to the wrong political views, or being personally obnoxious to or in the way of the prosecutor himself.”

  9. Naomi Schiff says:

    I admire these heroic women and hope they will be celebrated in story and song and film etc. even if not in the debased news media. May they live long and fulfilling lives.

      • Discontinued Barbie says:

        I don’t think it is as much, what you are saying, it’s how you are saying it.

        Being right about something doesn’t necessarily mean people will listen when you are using a tone that is not, how shall I say….educational.

        I love coming here to read the smart commentary. It helps my sanity to come here and read EW’s posts and I even joined that stupid hellhole X to read more from all of you on the EW team.
        We all know the regular media is about commercial consumption over education of the topics at hand.

        I understand your view point and I also know that you have the experience and knowledge that most of us laymen do not have. Which must be very frustrating when you feel surrounded by idiots. Most of us are really concerned citizens trying to figure out how to manage this crisis in the best way we can with as much good information we can gather.

        I will end this with thank you for all that you do and I hope that you can mange the anger of being surrounded by idiots. At least these idiots are trying to learn and figure out to be on the right side of history.

  10. Sussex Trafalgar says:

    I’m a septuagenarian. As a child, one of my neighbor’s house was the official voting precinct for our area. Consequently, every two years I accompanied my parents to the voting precinct where they would vote.

    My father made it clear to me at that early age that thousands and thousands of people died fighting to preserve the right to vote in the USA. Later, when I was old enough to vote, I was eager to vote and I’ve voted in every election since.

    I’ve always believed that being a caregiver was the most difficult and often thankless job in the world. I still do.

    Now, however, after the stuff Trump has done since he ran for president, I think being a voting precinct worker is a close second to being a caregiver; it is now a dangerous job, mentally and physically, and that is unacceptable.

    Freeman and Moss are heroes.

    As for Trump and Giuliani, they aren’t heroes!

  11. The Old Redneck says:

    One thing that hasn’t gotten enough attention is what our recent politics have meant for poll workers. Many are elderly and retired and just do the job out of a sense of civic duty. They get token wages or none at all. It’s none fair to ask anyone, much less people in that position, to do that work when they’re constantly being demonized and abused. The same goes for elections supervisors, who historically were nonpartisan and just tried to ensure that everyone got a chance to vote.
    I’m glad these two ladies got some justice (they will probably never recover a fraction of that verdict, but the symbolic victory is important). At the same time, I worry about poll workers all over the country. Many are being hounded into quitting because of repulsive behavior – of which Rudy’s is just a highly publicized example.

    • Sussex Trafalgar says:

      Exactly! Well said!

      I remember well when the voting precinct had the feeling of a sanctuary where all participants, voters, precinct workers and politicians running for office treated each other with respect. Partisanship remained outside the premise of the precinct.

      And then along came the spoiled brat malignant narcissist who has never respected anything in his privileged life, including but not limited to, voting rights, patriotism, money, women and decency.

    • Peterr says:

      The thing that amazes me about the older election workers is that they are doing a 15 hour job. You have to show up before the polls open, set up all the equipment, stay there through all the voting hours, then pack stuff up at the end of the day.

      This is work, folks. You get a break for lunch, and snacks throughout the day, but you are working a very long day. It’s not “8 hours and you can go home” or “when do I get a nap?” or “when does my relief show up to take my place?” You come before 6am and go home sometime after 8pm (in Missouri, anyway – your state may vary).

      God bless them, one and all.

      • likeagodcow says:

        I did it this year in November, and it was definitely 5:30 to 9-ish, about 15 hours. I’m a Black woman in Harris County, and I’ve wanted to do it for years just to confront any MAGAts who might want to come around. Alas, in training I learned that we’re not allowed to engage with “poll watchers” so I wasn’t going to be able to do that. But my oldest friend in the world is now a precinct judge, so I’ll be going back as long as I still live in Houston and he asks us. It’s a little tear inducing (in the actual patriotic way) when we hand them the sticker and thank them for voting.

  12. Mike Stone says:

    Our republic has been saved in the last few election cycles by the contributions of black females. I am not sure we deserve their efforts.

    • earlofhuntingdon says:

      It’s more a matter of sinking or rowing together. We’re all in the same rowboat. Like a marriage, a few people can carry the load alone for a time. But they shouldn’t and can’t keep carrying it by themselves. We all need to take a turn at the oars.

  13. earlofhuntingdon says:

    Another women’s story with a less happy outcome, whose meaning is only now being written. Good critique, of a well-researched but horrible NYT read, of how Alito, Gorsuch, Barrett, Kavanaugh, and Thomas orchestrated their long-planned determination to overturn Roe v. Wade, in the event, via the Dobbs decision. And how the leak about that decision froze positions, making a less draconian decision impossible. As Lithwick and Stern write, “the true shock of their piece lies in fact that none of it is shocking.”

    Every aspect of Dobbs departed from the court’s norms and tradition. Granting certiorari because the composition of the court has changed; allowing a party to radically change its position after cert has been granted; pre-gaming opinion drafts so justices can sign off within minutes; refusing to change material errors in a leaked draft? It’s all legal! It’s all constitutional! It’s how the court rolls! And if any of this surprises or upsets you, be advised there’s nothing you can do about it.

    Of the many aspects of that story that make one want to vomit is Kavanaugh’s arguing, admittedly his preaching to the choir, that the majority should hide for four months its decision to hear the Dobbs appeal, to distance it from the death of RBG, so as to suggest the outcome of Dobbs was not the expression of raw power that it was.

    It’s not an unusual technique: Detroit’s big three auto companies employ it regularly, to separate the firing of a senior executive from the real cause for it. But that’s big bidness. The Supreme Court once aspired to something less derisive of governance and public government. Brazenly lying to the public and the legal profession is their proud new norm, in their judgments and not just in their Senate confirmation testimony. The story should make reform of the federal courts a priority after November 2024.

    https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2023/12/new-york-times-scoop-fall-of-roe.html
    https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/15/us/supreme-court-dobbs-roe-abortion.html

  14. Hoping4better_times says:

    There is something else of note in Ruby Freeman’s name-
    Eschet Chayil from the Book of Proverbs:
    “A woman of valour who can find? For her price is far above RUBIES”
    And she is the Mother of another brave woman, Shaye Moss.
    Well done, Ruby and Shay. You fought the good fight and you won!

  15. Badger Robert says:

    Who repeated the false claims that were the basis of these cases, without appropriate limitation, and also does have the money to compensate the plaintiffs? Are we going to find out?

  16. Chirrut Imwe says:

    Thank you so much for this post. I needed to be reminded this trial was first and foremost about Ruby and Shaye.

    Brings to mind the song Hell You Talmbout by Janelle Monáe. David Byrne played it at the end of American Utopia with a similar impact.

  17. BirdGardener says:

    Thank you for another insightful article, Marcy.

    From what I’ve observed, Politico rotates the top articles, so which one is on top depends on what time you check the site. I check multiple times throughout the day, which is how I know. I don’t think we can draw any conclusions from their article’s placement at the time you saw it. It was one of the ones programmed to rotate into and out of the top spot, rather than one slotted for always secondary/tertiary etc. placement.

  18. Harry Eagar says:

    If I were still newspapering, I’d have written the same lede. Moss and freeman were not on trial, much as Giuliani wanted to make that so.

    But I’d have had a paired article on the theme that — as I expressed it last week in a comment I left on Law and Crime — It’s the women who will be the end of trump.

    • OldTulsaDude says:

      I dropped my subscription to WaPo and no longer read the NYT. I’m fed up with journalism that tries to appease biases instead of facts.

  19. Sue Romano says:

    Thank you for this. Charles Blow is documenting the reverse ‘migration North’ back to the South by People of Color to reclaim their political power. He moved from Brooklyn to Atlanta. I thought of Ruby, Shay and how historians will treat them as heroes in the era of truth vs lies.

    • ItTollsForYou says:

      Have you read his book, The Devil You Know? I found it incredibly well-written and -argued; though I don’t know how many people will be convinced by it.

  20. Error Prone says:

    A shoutout to the lawyers who took the case on a gamble. They stated a determination to collect on the judgment. They steered the testimony and put Rudy into the discovery box re evidence possibly relating to the criminal action.

    Also to those litigating against gerrymandering and voter intimidation – suppression.

    In Minnesota, in a recent decision, a state trial judge dismissed a challenge to a new law from last session allowing non-incarcerated felons to vote, regardless of any pending situation. In Florida its legislature went elsewhere, after the referendum they imposed a pay to play. Two states, two legislatures, two outlooks.

    Incidentally, Rudy has reduced his asking price for the NYC apartment to $6.1 million – from $6.5.

    https://www.sothebysrealty.com/eng/sales/detail/180-l-1182-s4lfjd/45-east-66th-street-10w-upper-east-side-new-york-ny-10065

    Do not know whether it was dropped before or after this verdict.

    • xyxyxyxy says:

      On a recent episode of MSW’s Aisle45 or Jack, don’t recall if it was Strzok or McCabe, one of them commented as to the ladies getting the apartment and they becoming a part of the high society of the city and being in demand to be a friend of every NYC celebrity.

    • NerdyCanuck says:

      holy cow! I knew his apartment was in the market and that it would be super opulent, but yeahhhhhhh I just clicked through to the listing for the first time and DUDE his *master bedroom alone* is 5x the size of my ENTIRE 2-bedroom walk-out basement apartment!!!

  21. Savage Librarian says:

    A great big Thank You to Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss! Your win is a win for all of us, for democracy. I am so grateful for everything you have done! Your losses have been great, I know, and very painful. But your gains are so far reaching they are immeasurable. You have lifted the spirit of the nation.

Comments are closed.