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The claim that Rudy Giuliani had been “inebriated” when he, as Donald Trump’s conspiratorial hype man, pushed the former president to prematurely declare victory over Joe Biden is indeed a distraction. But a day after the American public learned of Giuliani’s apparent condition on election night, the question arises: Is Giuliani wasted…right now?

Hints of an inebriated state abound. There’s the misspelling of “outright” and Bill Stepien, the former Trump campaign manager. The continued push of the false claim that Trump won. And perhaps most egregiously, the choice of Diet Pepsi over Diet Coke as one’s preferred diet soda. Taken together, it’s giving vintage Trump tweet with a fresh hint of melting Giuliani.

But his denial of being drunk only underscores this key takeaway from my colleague Dan Friedman. Giuliani may have taken the time to shoot down the headline-generating drunk claim—garnering yikes and laughs—but his statement conveniently forgets to address the January 6 committee’s most damning allegation. That he, as Trump’s personal lawyer, pushed the then-president into falsely declaring victory, ultimately helping to lay the foundation for the violence at the Capitol.

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LESS DREADING, MORE DOING

This is the rubber-meets-road moment: the early days in our first fundraising drive since we took a big swing and merged with CIR to bring fearless investigative reporting to the internet, radio, video, and everywhere else that people need an antidote to lies and propaganda.

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