DC attorney discipline board recommends Giuliani be disbarred over 2020 election

The Washington D.C. attorney discipline board recommended on Friday that Rudy Giuliani is disbarred over his role in preventing the transfer of power in the 2020 elections.

Giuliani's law license has already been suspended in Washington D.C. and the state of New York in 2021. A New York appeals court ruled that there was enough proof that Giuliani "communicated demonstrably false and misleading statements to courts, lawmakers and the public at large" in his efforts to overturn former President Donald Trump's failed 2020 reelection bid.

The former New York City mayor has also landed in hot water for his efforts to overturn the election results in Georgia. He was among 18 of Trump's co-conspirators to be indicted in the Peach state. 

“We conclude that disbarment is the only sanction that will protect the public, the courts, and the integrity of the legal profession, and deter other lawyers from launching similarly baseless claims in the pursuit of such wide-ranging yet completely unjustified relief,” the board wrote Friday, per CNN.

The recommendation comes after Giuliani faced a hearing in 2022 that weighed the ethics charges brought by the D.C. Bar’s disciplinary counsel, after he was accused of violating attorney conduct rules in Pennsylvania, where he sought to throw out more than a million votes in the state through a lawsuit. President Joe Biden won the state in 2020. 

The hearing committee ruled that Giuliani likely broke rules in the Pennsylvania, which the D.C. board agreed with on Friday.

“We agree with the Hearing Committee that the Pennsylvania litigation was based ‘only on speculation, mistrust, and suspicion,’” the opinion said. "[Giuliani presented] no facts to support the claims he made and his opinion that election impropriety occurred does not meet the requirements for filing a lawsuit.”

Giuliani's spokesman Ted Goodman said the recommendation was not surprising, "as partisan Democrats continue to destroy the credibility of the American justice system all in an effort to beat President Trump and to hold onto power.”

The recommendation comes after former Trump attorney Jenna Ellis faced a three-year suspension of her law license in Colorado on Tuesday, over her role in the Georgia 2020 election interference case.

A D.C. Appeals Court will make the final decision on whether Giuliani is disbarred.