Giuliani sued over 'big lie' election fraud claims

A voting machine company on Monday slapped a whopping $1.3 billion lawsuit against Donald Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani, accusing him of defamation in what it called his (quote) “big lie” about widespread fraud in the 2020 presidential election.

Dominion Voting Systems, which makes voting machines used in more than two dozen states, alleges the former New York City mayor and his allies (quote) “manufactured and disseminated the 'Big Lie,' which foreseeably went viral and deceived millions of people into believing that Dominion had stolen their votes and fixed the election."

Giuliani’s statements, the lawsuit said, were (quote) “calculated to — and did in fact — provoke outrage and cause Dominion enormous harm.”

Dominion filed an earlier lawsuit against Trump campaign lawyer Sidney Powell – also accusing her of spreading false conspiracy theories about the election that Trump lost to Democrat Joe Biden.

And a senior Dominion employee filed a defamation suit against the Trump campaign, saying he had been driven into hiding because of death threats from Trump supporters.

Giuliani and his lawyer, Robert Costello, did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Giuliani has stood by his claims about the election, saying during a radio show last week he is being attacked for (quote) "exercising my right of free speech and defending my client."

Trump and his allies spent two months denying his election defeat, and claiming without evidence that it was the result of widespread voter fraud, before his supporters stormed the Capitol on January 6th.

Last week, a group of prominent attorneys asked New York’s judiciary to suspend Giuliani’s law license.

In its lawsuit, Dominion stated that it is looking to set the record straight and to (quote) "stand up for itself, its employees, and the electoral process."