Rudy Giuliani’s Legal Defense Fund Has Raised $9,590 (Just $4,990,410 to Go!)

When we last checked in with Rudy Giuliani, things weren’t looking so hot for Donald Trump’s former personal attorney. Aside from having gone from “America’s mayor” to “what the hell happened to that guy”—which is a big aside!—Giuliani was facing a whole bunch of very serious legal issues including but not limited to: his apartment and office being raided as part of a criminal investigation into his Ukraine dealings; a Justice Department probe of his work involving Turkey; a defamation lawsuit from Dominion Voting Systems over his 2020 election lies; and the temporary suspension of his license to practice law. And as it turns out, things haven’t gotten much better for the former mayor of New York City, unless being forced to crowdfund his legal defense—and raising just 0.1918% of his goal—can somehow be construed as “better.”

Yes, weeks after his buddy Bernie Kerik asked people to spare whatever they could for Giuliani‘s legal bills, the “Rudy Giuliani Legal Defense Fund” has raised a mere $9,590, or less than 0.2% of the $5 million goal. (It’s not clear if the RGLDF is a separate entity the “Rudy Giuilani Freedom Fund” that Kerik helped create.) Kerik, the former NYC police commissioner, knows a little something about legal woes, having pleaded guilty in 2010 to tax fraud and other charges, before being pardoned, of course, by Donald Trump. You may also recall Kerik from other hits like reportedly conducting an affair at an apartment near Ground Zero that had been reserved for 9/11 rescue workers. On the fundraising page, the organizers encourage whatever kind of person identifies as a Giuliani groupie to pony up as much cash as they can to defend the former president’s former attorney, explaining “The swamp is revolting by placing a bull’s eye on the backs of every Trump loyalist. That puts Rudy at the top of their list. Rudy’s fate will determine if America still is a Republic governed by We The People!” Sadly for Rudy, that pitch has apparently mostly fallen on deaf ears.

What are Trump’s thoughts on the precarious financial situation that Giuliani finds himself in? According to a new tell-all from author Michael Wolff, very little! Per the Independent:

A new book says Donald Trump has “cast out” and “cut off” his former lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, for daring to ask that the former president pay him. “Trump is annoyed that he tried to get paid for his election challenge work,” Michael Wolff writes in the book, Landslide: The Final Days of the Trump Presidency, according to an excerpt published in The Times. After Mr Trump lost the 2020 presidential election, Mr Giuliani tried to overturn the results in dozens of failed lawsuits. But according to Landslide, all the former mayor has received for his efforts is “the cold shoulder” from Mr Trump and his family.

In the final week of his presidency, isolated and twice-impeached, Mr Trump ordered aides not to pay Mr Giuliani’s fees. According to The Washington Post, the outgoing president was furious at his allies for not doing enough to keep him in the White House—even at Mr Giuliani, who had done more than most.

To be fair, Giuliani probably should have seen this coming, given that Trump is famously known for stiffing his contractors, from dishwashers to painters to architects, and when confronted about it saying things like, “Maybe he didn’t do a good job and I was unsatisfied with his work.”

If you would like to receive the Levin Report in your inbox daily, click here to subscribe.

Alabama representative offers familiar legal argument re why he can’t be sued for helping incite January 6 riot

Like Donald Trump, Congressman Mo Brooks thinks he should escape responsibility for his part in encouraging the insurrection because he’s an employee of the government and that somehow makes it okay. Per The Washington Post:

Brooks (R-Ala.) has asked to be dismissed from a federal lawsuit alleging that he incited the Jan. 6 mob assault on the U.S. Capitol, claiming that he can’t be held liable because he was acting as a federal employee while challenging the 2020 election results in a fiery speech just before the riot began. Brooks said in a motion Friday that he should be dropped as a defendant or represented by the Justice Department in the case, filed March 5 by Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.). The lawsuit names former president Donald Trump, Brooks, Donald Trump Jr., and Rudolph W. Giuliani and seeks damages in connection with their statements to a crowd near the White House that the former president told to march to the Capitol.

“Today is the day American patriots start taking down names,” Brooks said, echoing Trump’s unfounded claims that the election was rigged. Brooks told people in the crowd that they were victims of a historic theft and asked whether they were ready to sacrifice their lives for their country.… In his filing Friday, Brooks invoked a 1988 law that protects federal employees from personal liability while acting within the scope of their office or employment. He argued that his speech, tweets and related conduct “were indisputably made in the context of and preparation for” a joint session of Congress on Jan. 6 to confirm the results of the presidential election. Trump has asked the judge to dismiss the case on similar grounds, claiming that as president he has absolute immunity from lawsuits over his official actions and was free to urge Congress to take actions favorable to him in its electoral count.

In their filing, Brooks’s attorneys claimed that the congressman was fulfilling his job as an elected official by spewing lies and dangerous rhetoric. “Brooks represented the interests of his constituency when Brooks challenged the Electoral College vote submittals of states whose election processes were less than reliable in the judgment of Brooks,” the filing reads. “It makes no difference whether Brooks was right or wrong.”

West Virginia governor tells anti-vaxxers to stop being so stupid

Harsh but fair! Per the New York Post:

West Virginians choosing not to receive a COVID-19 vaccine are entering a “death lottery,” the state’s governor said, as the portion of residents fully inoculated against the virus hovers around 46.4%. Gov. Jim Justice, whose state offered multiple lottery incentives to people who received a vaccine, said convincing younger people to get the shot continues to be a challenge. While 77.2% of adults over 65 are vaccinated, the rate drops to 53.3% for those ages 12 and up. “When it really boils right down to it, they’re in a lottery to themselves,” he told ABC News. “We have a lottery, you know, that basically says, ‘If you’re vaccinated, we’re going to give you stuff.’ Well, you’ve got another lottery going on. And it’s the death lottery.” 

On Wednesday, Justice will announce the winners of the third round of the “Do it for Babydog” lottery, the Post noted, which is apparently named after the governor’s English bulldog for some reason. (Are there large swaths of people who will get a vaccine not for their themselves or their friends and families but for a semi-famous dog? We’ll find out!) Prizes include $1 million cash, college scholarships, hunting licenses, weekend getaways, fishing licenses, and, this being West Virginia, rifles and shotguns. 

Mitt Romney bids his car elevator adieu

Good night sweet prince. Per The Salt Lake Tribune:

The Utah Republican has sold his beachfront home in La Jolla, Calif. It’s a property he and his wife, Ann, bought in 2008 for $12 million and then bulldozed to build a far larger home, frustrating some of their neighbors.… Romney’s opponents criticized him during the 2012 presidential race for planning to add a “car elevator” to his La Jolla home, using it to attempt to paint him as a rich, out-of-touch politician. Some in the neighborhood accused him of building a house that was out of character with the decidedly upscale area. His home is at the end of a cul-de-sac and abuts the ocean.

The car-elevator plans were probably one of the less controversial aspects of Romney’s 2012 bid for office, the more contentious matters being the binders full of women; his claim that 47% of Americans are poor slobs; and, of course, his decision to strap the family dog to the roof of his car for a 12-hour drive.

Elsewhere!

Biden announces door-to-door outreach, outlines other strategies to boost vaccinations (Washington Post)

What’s keeping democracy experts up most at night? An overturned election (NBC News)

Pentagon cancels $10 billion JEDI contract challenged by Amazon (Washington Post)

Jeff Bezos Hits Wealth Record of $211 Billion on Pentagon Move (Bloomberg)

JPMorgan, Goldman Call Time on Work-From-Home. Their Rivals Are Ready to Pounce (WSJ)

Japan Enlists Cutesy Mascot to Sell its Low-Yielding Bonds (Bloomberg)

J.D. Vance says he regrets since-deleted tweets criticizing Trump (Politico)

The FBI seized a LEGO set of the US Capitol building from a January 6 riot suspect (Insider)

Big cats, bears, ferrets get COVID-19 vaccine at Oakland Zoo (AP)

— Inside Jeffrey Epstein’s Decades-Long Relationship With Leslie Wexner
— Trump’s Deranged Replacement Theory Might’ve Lost Him the Election
— Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk Want to Burn Their Cash in Space
— Three Texans Bust Myths About the Alamo’s Famous “Last Stand”
— The Guy Who Could Send Trump to Prison May Soon Cooperate With the Feds
— Bill and Melinda Gates’s Epic Divorce Saga Enters Its Next Phase
— Juneteenth, Critical Race Theory, and the Winding Road Toward Reckoning
— Trump Is Now Urging People Not to Vaccinate Their Kids Against COVID
— From the Archive: Microsoft’s Odd Couple, in the Words of Paul Allen
— Not a subscriber? Join Vanity Fair to receive full access to VF.com and the complete online archive now.