Phoenix
CNN
—
Rudy Giuliani and 10 others pleaded not guilty in an Arizona court on Tuesday to charges of conspiring to alter the results of the 2020 presidential election.
The former New York mayor was also ordered to post a $10,000 bond Duck For the past one week, the government has been trying to summon him.
Giuliani was presented by a GOP operative at his 80th birthday party in Palm Beach, Florida, on Friday. Arizona prosecutors spent weeks trying to find Giuliani, eventually locating him based on some of his podcasts.
A grand jury in Arizona He handed over the charges Last month he accused a dozen Donald Trump associates, including voter fraud and several people associated with his campaign, of their efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss.
Giuliani and 10 other defendants entered not guilty pleas on Tuesday. Four of them appeared virtually and six appeared in person. The list includes: Trump ally Christina Papp, who now serves as the Republican National Committee’s top advocate for “election integrity”; former Trump campaign aide Mike Roman; and former Arizona Republican Party Chair Kelly Ward.
Former Trump lawyer John Eastman pleaded not guilty last week.
Six others are scheduled to appear next month, including former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, former Trump adviser Boris Epstein and former Trump campaign lawyer Jenna Ellis.
Although Trump is not among those charged in Arizona, the indictment details that he is “Unindicted Coconspirator 1.”
Setting a $10,000 cash bond with the condition that Giuliani appear in Arizona within a month, attorney Nicholas Klingerman told the judge that Giuliani has “failed to cooperate in this process.”
“We actually had two agents in Florida, at the time, sitting outside the party waiting for him to leave” to serve him, Klingerman said of Giuliani’s birthday party.
Later that evening, Giuliani issued a tweet saying that “if Arizona authorities can’t find me by tomorrow morning” they should drop the indictment. An hour after the post, Klingerman said, agents saw him leave the party and served him.
“I’m not hiding from anybody,” Giuliani told the judge during Tuesday’s hearing.
“I’ve had a fair number of threats … and I don’t have protection since I’m in bankruptcy. So I have very specific rules,” Giuliani said, explaining why agents could not serve him at this New York apartment.
Giuliani said he had attempted attacks on him in France and the Netherlands and said a bond would be “absolutely punitive”.
“I consider this indictment a complete disgrace to the American legal system. But I’m not showing any signs of non-compliance,” Giuliani said, adding, “Let’s see what we can do to destroy the Donald Trump movement.”
Giuliani told the judge he had no counsel, “other than the fact that I don’t have a copy of the indictment,” and offered to give his email address before the judge reminded him that he could handle the court case himself. He appeared in open court.
“Oh,” Giuliani said.
This story has been updated with additional details.
