In December 2020, Rudy Giuliani committed perjury before a Missouri House committee. That's not our assessment, it's his. Giuliani, the former New York mayor who became the chief spreader of lies for then-President Donald Trump in the wake of that year's election, effectively admitted recently that his voter-fraud allegations against two Georgia election workers were false.

Among those duped by that lie were members of the Missouri House Special Committee on Government Oversight, to which Giuliani testified via Zoom that month, under oath, pressing the very claims he now admits weren't true.

Missouri's legislative Republicans at the time were going all in to bolster Trump's big lie of a stolen election, despite incontrovertible evidence (even then) that it was all nonsense. Do those who remain in Missouri government today have enough self-respect — and more to the point, enough respect for their constituents — to now hold Giuliani accountable with a perjury charge?

The issue stems from a pending defamation suit against Giuliani by Ruby Freeman and Wandrea "Shaye" Moss, the-mother-and-daughter Georgia election workers targeted by Giuliani and others who claimed a video showed them stuffing ballots into a suitcase. The video showed no such thing, but Trump's minions spread the lie diligently enough to subject Freeman and Moss to a dangerous harassment campaign by unhinged Trump supporters.

Among the platforms for those and other of Giuliani's lies was the Missouri House committee hearing on Dec. 14, 2020.

Weeks ahead of the Jan. 6, 2021, mob assault on the U.S. Capitol, Republican lawmakers in Missouri, as in other red states, were doing whatever they could to legitimize Trump's election-fraud lies.

A legally meaningless but incendiary resolution in Missouri that month called for election-fraud investigations in six states won by Joe Biden, including Georgia. Giuliani's remote testimony was arranged by the Missouri House committee's Republican majority in furtherance of that tax-funded farce.

In contentious testimony, Giuliani doubled down on his lie about the Georgia ballots and accused Democrats on the committee of "covering up massive election fraud."

"Obviously, you have no interest in the truth," said the man who, in a court filing last month, formally acknowledged he can't back up what he told the committee.

Giuliani's July 25 filing in the pending defamation lawsuit against him stipulates that he "does not contest the factual allegations" made in the suit — that is, the allegations that he lied about Freeman and Moss.

Giuliani's lawyer has downplayed the significance of the stipulation, calling it a legal maneuver designed to ultimately get the case dismissed. Regardless, it's a de facto admission that the claims Giuliani made, which put two innocent women's lives in danger, were baseless.

Try to imagine admitting to spreading such a toxic lie if you hadn't actually lied.

Giuliani's lies have already led to suspension of his law license in New York and a pending disbarment proceeding in Washington, D.C. He has also been widely identified as an unindicted co-conspirator in the federal criminal case against Trump, meaning he could yet face criminal charges himself.

The man once lauded as "America's mayor" clearly (and rightly) now faces a much harsher judgment by history — if not by Jefferson City.

In light of the recent court filing, one of the Missouri Democrats who sparred with Giuliani in that 2020 hearing, state Rep. Peter Merideth of St. Louis, is renewing his call to prosecute Giuliani here for perjury.

"Rudy blatantly lied to us, under oath. That's perjury," Merideth told the Missouri Independent last week. He added that Giuliani "should be prosecuted." But he acknowledged the chances of that happening under Missouri's GOP-controlled government are "zero."

"Republicans love to scream about nonexistent voter impersonation, all while trying to commit the greatest voter fraud in American history," Merideth told the news site.

As for the fraud perpetrated by Giuliani against Missouri's lawmakers — and, by extension, against all the state's citizens — there's no indication the Republican legislative majority plans to do anything to hold him accountable. Which is yet another reason the state's voters should hold them accountable in next year's elections.

REPRINTED FROM THE ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH

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