Election Worker Defamed by Giuliani Recounts Emotional Toll

On Dec. 4, 2020, Shaye Moss, at the time an election worker in Fulton County, Ga., was summoned to her supervisor’s office, where she thought she would be getting a promotion for her hard work on Election Day, after a month of positive feedback.

Instead, Ms. Moss was shown videos filled with “lies” and unfounded accusations that she and her mother, a co-worker, had tried to steal votes in the vital swing state from President Donald J. Trump, she testified in Federal District Court in Washington on Tuesday.

From the moment she got that heads up, her life was altered. Soon, she and her 14-year-old son were inundated with threats, racist messages and calls. “Be glad it’s 2020 and not 1920” was one warning she received on Facebook.

“That was the day that everything changed,” Ms. Moss told a jury in a civil trial to determine what damages Rudolph W. Giuliani should pay for defaming her and her mother, Ruby Freeman, by spreading the baseless reports that they had tried to cheat Mr. Trump out of votes. “Everything in my life changed. The day that I changed. The day that everything just flipped upside down.”

Georgia officials quickly debunked the accusations, and a yearslong investigation cleared Ms. Moss and Ms. Freeman of any wrongdoing. But Ms. Moss is unrecognizable to herself, crippled by fear, anxiety and depression, she said during hours of emotional testimony.

“I’m most scared of my son finding me and, or my mom, hanging in front of my house in front of a tree,” she said, fighting back tears, as Mr. Giuliani, the former New York City mayor and federal prosecutor, sat nearby, showing no emotion.

“Most days I pray that God does not wake me up, that I just disappear,” she said.

It was the second day of the trial, and her testimony brought to life the impact of the falsehoods that Mr. Giuliani helped to promote in the aftermath of Election Day 2020. At the time, Mr. Giuliani was serving as Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer and helped lead the efforts to keep him in office after he lost the 2020 election.

The women are seeking compensatory damages between $15.5 million and $43 million, an amount Mr. Giuliani’s lawyer on Monday said was the civil equivalent of the death penalty.

The judge presiding over the case, Beryl A. Howell, previously ruled that Mr. Giuliani had spread lies about the women, intentionally inflicted emotional distress on them and engaged in a conspiracy with others.

Throughout her testimony, Ms. Moss described the pain inflicted on people she loves, particularly the racism embedded in the accusations and threats she said were spurred by Mr. Giuliani.

The relentless calls and texts to Ms. Moss’s son interfered with his school work. She said he ended up with failing grades in his first year of high school.

“He didn’t deserve that,” she said through tears.

When Mr. Giuliani’s lawyer, Joseph Sibley IV, questioned Ms. Moss, he tried to make the point that the racist comments could not be directly linked to his client, a notion Ms. Moss strongly rebutted. She said Mr. Giuliani assumed that all of the Fulton County election workers were Democrats because they were all Black.

“I feel like that is the beginning of the race issue,” she said, adding that he did not go on “BET Nightly News” to talk about his conspiracy theory, but instead went to media platforms where “he knew his people would believe his lies.”

Mr. Giuliani has yet to testify in court, but despite the judge’s ruling — and his own previous acknowledgment that he had made false and defamatory accusations about the women — repeated his accusations on Monday evening as he left the courthouse.

“Everything I said about them is true,” Mr. Giuliani told journalists. “They were engaging in changing votes.”

On Tuesday morning, Judge Howell told Mr. Sibley that comments like those could be considered another defamation claim.

When she asked if Mr. Sibley knew about his client’s statements, Mr. Sibley deflected and said he was not with him at the time, while Mr. Giuliani nodded his head in affirmation behind him. Judge Howell then asked Mr. Giuliani directly if he made those statements, and he said, “yes.”

Mr. Sibley also suggested that the long days in the courtroom could be taking a toll on Mr. Giuliani, 79. Judge Howell asked Mr. Sibley if he was concerned about his client’s age and mental capacity issues. Mr. Sibley said he had not seen evidence of that yet.

Judge Howell said she had observed Mr. Giuliani paying close attention and being responsive.

“He’s following everything I’m saying quite closely,” she said Tuesday morning.

Mr. Giuliani has rankled Judge Howell several times throughout the case. He refused to turn over routine documents about his net worth and wide reach on social media. He skipped one of the final hearings on the case. And on the first day of the trial, he was late to the courtroom.

On Tuesday, Judge Howell said, “Mr. Sibley has a hard job.”

Mr. Sibley told the jury, “My client, as you saw last night, likes to talk a lot, unfortunately.”

The trial is expected to last a week and include testimony from Ms. Freeman and Mr. Giuliani.