Feds raid Giuliani's home escalating criminal probe; son calls FBI raids 'disgusting'

US Federal authorities early Wednesday raided the Manhattan apartment of former President Donald Trump's personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, over ex-New York mayor's dealings with Ukraine, sources told multiple US broadcasters. In the highest-profile action seen yet, the federal investigators executed search warrants as part of a criminal investigation against the Trump’s aide as they barged into the DC area of the lawyer and seized Giuliani's electronic devices, a close associate of former Mayor Rudy Giuliani told news reporters.

Agents forming a team also scattered outside Victoria Toensing’s Washington, D.C residence and confiscated her phone, but left without searching her house. The raid was a part of a probe into whether Giuliani acted on behalf of Ukrainian oligarchs to lobby for the Trump administration. Investigators frantically searched for evidence of the crime as Trump’s attorney was under investigation for his role in the 2019 ousting of US ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch, whom he admitted he had got removed by “convincing” former President Donald Trump. 

Trump’s attorney is at risk of facing criminal charges if he would have aided Ukrainian officials and withheld the information from the US Department of Justice in breach of the Foreign Agents Registration Act. Former Ambassador of the United States to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch gave a key House testimony against the Trump administration’s lobbying with Ukrainian officials during the ex-president's first impeachment when he was in office. She alleged that Trump engaged in a quid pro quo in a telephonic conversation with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky when he threatened to cut military aid for investigation on Biden. In a recent probe into the business dealings of the 76-year-old former President Trump’s personal lawyer, uniformed Fed agents on Madison Avenue and his office on Park Avenue, searching for evidence to prove that Giuliani committed a federal crime. 

[New York City Police officers walk out of the apartment building where former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani resides. Credit: AP]

Trump’s ex-lawyer accuses feds of ‘double standards’

A statement released by Rudy Giuliani’s lawyer Robert Costello said: “Mr. Giuliani respects the law, and he can demonstrate that his conduct as a lawyer and a citizen was absolutely legal and ethical.” Giuliani lambasted the federal authorities of “corrupt double standard,” for investigating him on allegations that he had pushed against the Democrats. He said, that the US Justice Department was “running roughshod over the constitutional rights of anyone involved in, or legally defending, former President Donald J. Trump.”

Wednesday’s raid comes months later as ex-President lost the legal protections for himself and his ability to pardon allies for federal crimes. Giuliani’s lawyer, Costello, told The Wall Street Journal that the Feds searches were breaching the foreign lobbying rules and that the warrants were tapping into Giuliani’s private conversation with allies including John Solomon, a former columnist, and frequent Fox News anchor. 

Trump’s former attorney berated the investigators for “ignoring” copies of Hunter Biden’s computer hard drives, as he called the search warrants against him “Trump Derangement Syndrome.” Meanwhile his son, Andrew Giuliani told reporters outside his father’s swank Manhattan apartment building on East 66th Street in a televised address:

“It has to stop. If this can happen to the former president’s lawyer, this can happen to any American. Enough is enough.” Andrew continued: “This is disgusting. This is absolutely absurd. And it’s the continued politicization of the Justice Department, as we have seen.”

He added that the charges of lobbying for Ukraine did not belong to his father but US President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden. When asked by a reporter that a Federal judge signed the search orders, Andrew lambasted: “I’ll answer that! An Obama-era judge signed off on that!” 

“Keep in mind that the agents could not read the physical hard drives without plugging them in, but they took Mr. Giuliani’s word that the hard drives were copies of Hunter Biden’s hard drive and did not contain anything pertaining to Mr. Giuliani,” the statement from Giuliani said. “It is outrageous that the Trump Derangement Syndrome has gone so far that hatred has driven this unjustified and unethical attack on the United States Attorney and Mayor who did more to reduce crime than virtually any other in American history,” it added.