In the Dominion, Powell, MyPillow-Lindell case, Rudy Giuliani was absent

June 28, 2021: -Rudy Giuliani did not show up for Thursday’s court hearing in a $1.3 billion defamation case against him that took place after his New York law license was suspended because of his alleged “false and misleading” claims about the elections of 2020.

All the other prominent figures involved in the hearing, MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell, lawyer Sidney Powell, Dominion Voting Systems chief John Poulos, and famed attorney Alan Dershowitz were in attendance person or by calling.

But Giuliani’s lawyer in the case, Joseph Sibley, told a federal judge in Washington that he was the one person there to represent Giuliani in his bid to have the case dismissed.

A New York state appellate court suspended Giuliani, a former mayor of New York City and the U.S. attorney for Manhattan for once, from practicing law in the Empire State on Thursday.

In their searing order, the five judges cited Giuliani’s “demonstrably false and statements that were misleading,” made in his capacity as former President Donald Trump’s lawyer, and to bolster the baseless narrative that the 2020 election was stolen because of the widespread fraud.

The temporary suspension came a day before the 52nd anniversary of Guiliani as a licensed lawyer in N.Y. It will stay in place pending the outcome of a formal disciplinary hearing.

Dominion in the lawsuits argues that Giuliani, Lindell, and Powell had each damaged its reputation after spreading dozens of lies and misleading claims regarding the company and its role in the contest amid Trump and Biden.

In April, Sibley filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, arguing that Dominion’s claims for relief were not brought following proper procedural standards of the court.

That argument differed from one brought by Powell’s lawyers, who argued in part that “no reasonable person” would believe that her false claims and conspiracy theories about the 2020 election were “truly statements of fact.”

Dominion, which operated voting machines in numerous states during the 2020 election cycle, requests roughly $1.3 billion in damages in each of those cases. Dominion has also sued Fox News for $1.6 billion, accusing the network of falsely claiming that it had rigged the election. Fox has moved to dismiss that case.