Rudy Giuliani’s transformation in the White House has a simple source: the convergence, in the last year-and-a-half, of money and power.
In the storied career of America’s most famous mayor, the last five weeks have been quite a chapter. During a shouting match on CNN on Sept. 19, Rudy Giuliani denied and then, 30 seconds later, admitted to playing a central role in President Donald Trump’s efforts to get a foreign country to investigate his top 2020 rival, Joe Biden.
Story continuesSo what is going on with him? Interviews with those close to the former mayor, and those who have crossed paths with him in his work for Trump, say Giuliani’s transformation has a simple source: over the past 18 months, he has violated that unwritten rule of American public life that you can pursue money or political power, but not both at once.
And gain he did: where the salary of the actual Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, was $210,700 last year, until the past few years Giuliani seemed to enjoy a lavish, approximately $230,000-a-month lifestyle that includes six homes, access to private jets and 11 country-club memberships, according to his recent divorce–court filings published by the New York Times.
Things began going wrong around April, when special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe was drawing to a close. Fighting Mueller had been job one for Giuliani and had brought him closer than ever to the President. Serendipitously, Giuliani now says, he had uncovered another scandal. This one involved a series of conspiracy theories in Ukraine, including a search for dirt on Joe Biden’s son Hunter, who had been paid to sit on the board of a Ukrainian energy company when Biden was Vice President.
At some point soon, Trump may face the reality of a trial in the Senate over charges he abused his office. Some of those allegations will be linked to Giuliani’s efforts in Ukraine. Giuliani’s increasingly erratic behavior suggests that his gravy train of easy deals tied to political power may come to an ugly end. The question is what else will come to an end with it.
Giuliani’s foray in Armenia is just one of his many gigs. Around the same time that he traveled to Yerevan, he was paid by a global consulting firm to send a letter calling for changes to Romania’s anti-corruption program, a position that contradicted the U.S. State Department’s stance. He attended an event by Congolese lobbyists that left them with the impression he would work with them on the Trump Administration’s position on sanctions on the country. His firm secured a $1.
Friends defend his business endeavors. “He’s always wanted to make money since he left as mayor, so what?” says Jon Sale, a former Watergate prosecutor who knew Giuliani when they both worked as federal prosecutors in Manhattan. “In a lot of circles, Rudy’s stature is not what it was. But I’ve been with him in some places and some parts of the country where people still continue to revere him. People come up to take a picture with him and for autographs and say, ‘Thank you Mr.
Giuliani also went to work for a variety of high-paying but controversial clients both as a lawyer and as a security consultant. His consulting firm signed a contract with Qatar around 2005 at a time when the Gulf state’s security forces were under scrutiny for letting the Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammed slip away from the FBI in 1996.
In 2000, at the Inner Circle dinner, a rollicking convention of big names and comedians, Giuliani wore a lavender dress and blond wig for a spoof video in which Trump leers at Giuliani and says, “You know, you’re really beautiful.” When Giuliani sprays perfume on his chest, Trump rubs his face in it. “Oh you dirty boy,” Giuliani says in a high-pitched voice, and slaps him.
For months, Giuliani had a good run under Trump. Even while many close to the President warned that relying on Giuliani could be his downfall, the former mayor was able to carry out both his freewheeling deals and Trump’s wishes without restraints. As White House advisers came and went in a steady stream of firings and resignations, Giuliani endured.
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