Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani was released on a $150,000 bond on Wednesday after being arrested on charges he helped Donald Trump try to overturn the 2020 election results in the southern US state of Georgia.
The 79-year-old Giuliani, who served as Trump’s personal lawyer while he was in the White House, was booked at the Fulton County Jail in Atlanta, according to jail records.
Trump, the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, is expected to turn himself in at the same jail on Thursday to face charges he sought to upend the 2020 presidential election won by Democrat Joe Biden.
Bail for the former Republican president has been set at $200,000.
The 77-year-old Trump and 18 co-defendants face racketeering, conspiracy and other charges and were given a deadline of noon (1600 GMT) on Friday to surrender to Georgia authorities.
At least eight of those facing charges have turned themselves in so far.
Sidney Powell, a Trump campaign lawyer who pushed wild election conspiracy theories about foreign manipulation of voting machines, was among those who were also booked on Wednesday. She was released on $100,000 bond.
Another co-defendant, Trump’s White House chief of staff, Mark Meadows, has asked Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis for an extension as he seeks to have the case moved from a Georgia state court to federal court. Willis denied the request.
‘Travesty’
Speaking to reporters after his booking, Giuliani, a former federal prosecutor, said the “indictment is a travesty.”
“It’s an attack on not just me, not just president Trump,” he said. “This is an attack on the American people.
“Fani Willis will go down in American history for having conducted one of the worst attacks on the American Constitution ever when this case is dismissed,” he added.
Giuliani served as the mayor of New York from 1994 to 2001, guiding the city through the shock of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and has served as a legal adviser to Trump in recent years.
John Eastman, a former campaign attorney for Trump, and Scott Hall, a bail bondsman, were booked on Tuesday at the Fulton County Jail.
Eastman, a conservative constitutional law scholar, is accused of drawing up a scheme to submit a false slate of Trump electors to Congress from Georgia instead of the legitimate Biden electors.
Speaking to reporters after being booked, Eastman said: “I am confident that when the law is faithfully applied in this proceeding, all of my co-defendants and I will be fully vindicated.”
Asked if he continued to believe, as Trump falsely claims, that the election was stolen, Eastman replied, “Absolutely.”
“No question in my mind,” he said.
Trump facing four criminal trials
Trump was indicted in Georgia last week after a sprawling, two-year probe into his efforts to overturn his election defeat in the Peach State.
District Attorney Willis has asked a judge to set a trial date of March 4 next year for Trump and the other co-defendants.
Trump is facing four criminal trials as he bids for a return to the White House.
Aside from Georgia, he faces charges in New York of paying hush money to a porn star, in Florida for mishandling top secret government documents and in Washington for conspiring to overturn his 2020 election loss.
