DOJ asks for outside lawyer to review Giuliani evidence

Justice Department prosecutors are requesting that a federal judge appoint an outside lawyer to review the records obtained in a search of Rudy Giuliani’s apartment last week to help dispel allegations that former President Trump’s ex-personal attorney is being treated unfairly. 

Manhattan prosecutors in a letter to U.S. District Judge J. Paul Oetken unsealed in court Tuesday requested the designation of a “special master” to look over the documents obtained as part of a probe into Giuliani’s contacts with Ukrainian officials while he served as Trump’s lawyer. 

Prosecutors in their Tuesday letter cited a similar appointment by a judge in the case against another of Trump’s previous personal attorneys, Michael Cohen. 

According to The Washington Post, federal prosecutors cited in their argument for a court-appointed special master “the unusually sensitive privilege issues that the Warrants may implicate.” 

Additionally, they argued that such an appointment would be important both to the fairness and “the perception of fairness” in the investigation into Giuliani. 

FBI agents last week conducted a search of Giuliani’s New York City apartment and office, seizing electronic devices to aid in the ongoing investigation into whether the former New York mayor illegally lobbied the Trump administration on behalf of Ukrainian oligarchs.

Days later, The Wall Street Journal reported that federal investigators in the search sought to obtain evidence related to or with associates who pushed for the firing of former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch. 

Among those reportedly included in the warrants were former Ukrainian prosecutors general Viktor Shokin and Yuriy Lutsenko, former Ukrainian prosecutor Kostiantyn Kulyk and former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko. 

Giuliani has repeatedly pushed back against the federal investigation into him, claiming in a Fox News interview Monday that federal prosecutors were attempting to “frame” him using the Foreign Agents Registration Act due to his support for Trump. 

“They are trying to find something they can make into a crime, some technical violation, some mistake I made,” he argued. 

“There is no way on Earth that they could have anyone telling the truth that I was acting as a foreign agent,” he continued, “nor do they have any evidence that I tried to influence the government on behalf of clients.”

The Hill has reached out to Giuliani for comment on Tuesday’s letter from federal prosecutors.