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Rudolph William Louis "Rudy" Giuliani III KBE "America's Mayor" (born May 28 1944 in Brooklyn, New York) served as the Mayor of New York City from January 1 1994 through December 31 2001. He is currently Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Giuliani Partners LLC, which he founded in January 2002, and a name partner in the Houston-based law firm Bracewell & Giuliani LLP.

He gained worldwide renown for his leadership in the wake of the September 11 attacks, which garnered him admiration in New York, and elsewhere. *" target="_blank" >As Mayor of New York City prior to the attacks of September 11, Giuliani's legacy was fairly tendentious; while NYC's crime rate shrank significantly during Giuliani's tenure, his "tough-on-crime" policies have been **.

Giuliani is thought to be a potential presidential candidate in 2008. His name has consistently been near the top of early polls of potential Republican Party candidates for the 2008 election.

Although he is a moderate Republican, he has been trying to charm social conservative voters in the Republican Party in hope of clinching the Republican nomination in 2008 for President. On May 18, 2006, it was announced that Giuliani was campaigning on behalf of conservative Lieutenant Governor of Georgia candidate Ralph Reed. On June 13, 2006 Giuliani started a website called Solutions America ostensibly to help elect Republicans candidates around the nation, but might also be a prelude to a 2008 presidential run.

Early career

Giuliani was born in Brooklyn, New York to Harold Angelo Giuliani and Helen C. D'Avanzo, the children of Italian immigrants. He was raised in Garden City South on Long Island and attended Manhattan College before graduating from New York University School of Law magna cum laude in 1968. Upon graduation, he clerked for Judge Lloyd MacMahon, United States District Judge for the Southern District of New York.

In 1970, Giuliani joined the Office of the US Attorney. In 1973, he was named Chief of the Narcotics Unit and rose to serve as executive US Attorney. In 1975, Giuliani was recruited to Washington, D.C., where he was named Associate Deputy Attorney General and chief of staff to the Deputy Attorney General. His first high-profile prosecution was of Congressman Bert Podell, who was convicted of corruption. From 1977 to 1981, Giuliani practiced law at the Patterson, Belknap, Webb and Tyler law firm.

In 1981, Giuliani was named Associate Attorney General, placing him in the third-highest position in the Department of Justice. As Associate Attorney General, Giuliani supervised all of the US Attorney Offices' Federal law enforcement agencies, the Department of Corrections, the Drug Enforcement Administration, and the United States Marshals Service.

In a well-publicized 1982 case, Giuliani testified in defense of the US government's "detention posture" of interning over 2,000 unlawfully-immigrated Haitian refugees in refugee camps, at one point stating that there was "no political repression" under President Jean-Claude "Baby Doc" Duvalier.*

In 1983, Giuliani was appointed U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York. It was in this position that he first gained national prominence by prosecuting numerous high-profile cases, including the successful prosecutions of Wall Street figures Ivan Boesky and Michael Milken for insider trading.

Giuliani attracted some criticism for arranging very public arrests of people, then dropping charges for lack of evidence rather than going to trial. He also spearheaded the effort to jail drug dealers, combat organized crime, break the web of corruption in government, and prosecute white-collar criminals. He amassed a record of 4,152 convictions with only 25 reversals.

It was in 1983 that Giuliani indicted Marc Rich on charges of tax evasion and making illegal oil deals with Iran during the hostage crisis. Rich fled the United States to avoid prosecution, and was controversially pardoned by President Bill Clinton in 2001.*

In 1984, Giuliani indicted Paul Castellano for racketeering and involvement in the La Cosa Nostra Commission. Giuliani posed a very large threat to organized crime, and was arguably one of the biggest adversaries to organized crime in American history.

Giuliani first ran for New York City Mayor as the candidate of both the Republican and Liberal parties, attempting to succeed Ed Koch in 1989. Democrat David Dinkins was elected by a margin of 47,080 votes in 1,899,845 votes cast, in the closest election in city history.*

Mayoralty

1993 campaign and election

The principal issues of the election of 1993 were crime and taxes. Giuliani also campaigned on what he perceived to be the unchecked expansion of the city's budget and the lack of managerial competence of incumbent David Dinkins. While Dinkins had frequently and eloquently voiced his affection for New York City diversity while in office, his tenure bore witness to anti-Semitic rioting in Crown Heights and an Al Sharpton-led boycott of Korean businesses in Brooklyn.

Giuliani promised a return to social order, addressing day-to-day issues rather than past or imminent crises:

The "street tax" paid to drunk and drug-ridden panhandlers.
The squeegee men shaking down the motorist waiting at a light.
The trash storms, the swirling mass of garbage left by peddlers and panhandlers and open-air drug bazaars on unclean streets.*

Giuliani's message focused on an alleged breakdown of social and political order that Dinkins had been either unwilling or unable to effectively address: the rise in unemployment during an economic downturn(6.7% in 1989 to 11.1% in 1992), the rate of crime in NYC reaching an all-time peak, and the August 1991 Crown Heights Riot, all were contrasted with Dinkins's appeal to the "gorgeous mosaic" of New York ethnic diversity.

Giuliani won the election by a margin of 53,367 votes, with 49.25% of the electorate to the incumbent's 46.42% share. He became the first Republican elected Mayor of New York City since John Lindsay won re-election in 1969.

Crime control

In his first term as mayor, Giuliani, in conjunction with New York City Police Department Commissioner Bill Bratton, adopted an aggressive enforcement-deterrent strategy based on James Q. Wilson's Broken Windows theory. This involved crackdowns on relatively minor offenses such as jaywalking, turnstile jumping, and aggressive "squeegeemen", on the principle that this would send a message that order would be maintained, and that the city would be "cleaned up". Critics alleged that Giuliani's policies curtailed the civil liberties of innocent citizens.

Giuliani also directed the New York City Police Department to aggressively pursue enterprises linked to organized crime, such as the Fulton Fish Market and the Javits Center on the West Side (Gambino crime family), in the breaking up of mob control of solid waste removal, the city was able to save city businesses over $600 million.

One of the first initiatives of Giuliani and Bratton was the institution of CompStat in 1994, a comparative statistical approach to mapping crime geographically and in terms of emerging criminal patterns, as well as charting officer performance by quantifying criminal apprehensions. CompStat was operationalized by the empowerment of precinct commanders, based on the assumption that local authorities could best institute crime reduction techniques specific to their experiential knowledge of their own localities. This system also enhanced the accountability of both the commanders and the officers themselves. Critics of the system assert that it creates an environment in which police officials are encouraged to underreport or otherwise manipulate crime data.*

Giuliani continued to highlight crime reduction and law enforcement as central missions of his mayoralty throughout both terms, efforts which largely met with success. However, concurrent with his achievements, a number of tragic cases of abuse of authority took place, and numerous allegations of civil rights abuses were leveled.

Giuliani's own Deputy Mayor, Rudy Washington, alleged that he had been harassed by police on several occasions. More controversial still were several police shootings of unarmed suspects*, and the scandals surrounding the brutalization of Abner Louima and the killing of Amadou Diallo.

In a case less nationally-publicized than those of Louima and Diallo, unarmed bar patron Patrick Dorismond was killed shortly after declining the overtures of what turned out to be an undercover officer soliciting illegal drugs. Even while hundreds of outraged New Yorkers protested, Giuliani staunchly supported the New York City Police Department, going so far as to take the unprecedented step of releasing Dorismond's "extensive criminal record" to the public.York City Police Department.protest/

The amount of credit Giuliani's policies deserve for the drop in the crime rate is somewhat disputed. A small but significant nationwide drop in crime preceded Giuliani's election, and he may have partially been the beneficiary of a trend already in progress. Another factor in the overall decline in crime during the 1990's was the federal government provision of temporary funding for an additional 7,000 police officers and an overall improvement in the national economy. However, unlike other major cities, New York City crime actually dropped below the national average for the first time since statistics have been available (see graph to the right), a feat thought impossible just years earlier.

Nonetheless, as promises of crime reduction comprised a substantial portion of Giuliani's initial campaigning for the mayoralty, the measures taken by the Giuliani administration are perceived by many New Yorkers to have been effective. This perception is apparently not only limited to New York City residents, as several programs similar to CompStat were subsequently instituted by a variety of urban police departments nationwide.**

Urban reconstruction

Giuliani pursued similarly aggressive real estate policies. The Times Square redevelopment project saw Times Square transformed from a run-down center for businesses ranging from tourist attractions and peep shows to a high-price district filled with family-oriented stores and theaters, including the MTV studios and a massive Disney store and theater. Giuliani faced much opposition to these changes, which displaced low income residents of the area in favor of large corporations. His relationships with these organizations were further criticized for reducing the amount of usable public space in the city while increasing the amount of private corporate space. Throughout his term, Giuliani pursued the construction of new sports stadiums in Manhattan, a goal in which he did not succeed, though new minor league baseball stadiums opened in Brooklyn, for the Brooklyn Cyclones, and in Staten Island, for the Staten Island Yankees.

Media management

Giuliani, after being elected, started a weekly call-in program on WABC radio. He avoided one-on-one interviews with the press, preferring to only speak to them at press conferences or on the steps of City Hall. Giuliani made frequent visits to The Late Show with David Letterman television show, sometimes appearing as a guest and sometimes participating in comedy segments. In one highly publicized appearance that took place shortly after his election, Giuliani filled a pothole in the street outside the Ed Sullivan theater.

Run for United States Senate

In April 1999 Giuliani formed an exploratory committee in connection with the 2000 New York United States Senate election, seeking the Republican nomination to fill the seat vacated by the retiring Daniel Patrick Moynihan. His expected Democratic opponent was Hillary Rodham Clinton. On May 19, 2000, before the Republican primary, which he was expected to win, he withdrew his candidacy because of prostate cancer and the fallout from his relationship with his wife Donna Hanover. Giuliani admit he had an "adult relationship" with Judith Nathan, now Judith Giuliani. New York Congressman Rick Lazio replaced Giuliani as the Republican nominee and lost to Clinton.

Opposition to Brooklyn Museum art exhibit

In 1999 Giuliani threatened to cut off city funding for the Brooklyn Museum if the museum did not remove a number of works in an exhibit entitled “Sensation: Young British Artists from the Saatchi Collection.” One work in particular, The Holy Virgin Mary by Turner Prize winning-artist Chris Ofili (a Catholic himself), featured the Virgin Mary next to elephant dung and female genitalia pictures. It was targeted as being offensive to some in the Christian community in New York, leading the artist to comment that "This is all about control."

In its defense, the museum filed a lawsuit, charging Giuliani with violating the First Amendment right to freedom of speech. Religious groups such as the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights supported the mayor's actions, while it was condemned by groups such as the American Civil Liberties Union, objecting to the mayor's censorship and interference with the first amendment rights of the museum. The museum's lawsuit was successful; the mayor was ordered to resume funding, and the judge, Federal District Judge Nina Gershon, declared that *here is no federal constitutional issue more grave than the effort by government officials to censor works of expression and to threaten the vitality of a major cultural institution as punishment for failing to abide by governmental demands for orthodoxy.

Role during 9/11 attack

The defining episode in Giuliani's career was his management of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center. He coordinated the response of various city departments while organizing the support of state and federal authorities for the World Trade Center site, for city-wide anti-terrorist measures, and for restoration of destroyed infrastructure. He made frequent appearances on radio and television to communicate critical information to the public authoritatively: for example, to indicate that tunnels would be closed as a precautionary measure, and that there was no reason to believe that the dispersion of chemical or biological weaponry into the air were a factor in the attack. He balanced the need to make hundreds of decisions directly and immediately, to delegate hundreds of others, and to visit the injured and console the families of the dead.

When Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal suggested that the attacks were an indication that the United States "should re-examine its policies in the Middle East and adopt a more balanced stand toward the Palestinian cause," Giuliani met the assertion with defiance, declaring,

There is no moral equivalent for this act. There is no justification for it... And one of the reasons I think this happened is because people were engaged in moral equivalency in not understanding the difference between liberal democracies like the United States, like Israel, and terrorist states and those who condone terrorism. So I think not only are those statements wrong, they're part of the problem.[http://archives.cnn.com/2001/US/10/11/rec.giuliani.prince/

With that, New York City rejected the prince's $10 million donation to disaster relief in the aftermath of the attack.

In the wake of the attacks, Giuliani was widely hailed for his decisive and undaunted leadership during the crisis. For this, he was named TIME magazine's Person of the Year for 2001, and given an honorary knighthood by Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom on February 13, 2002.*

Image
Giuliani in his public statements mirrored the emotions of New Yorkers at the time: shock, sadness, anger, resolution to rebuild, and the desire for justice to be done to those responsible. "Tomorrow New York is going to be here," he said. "And we're going to rebuild, and we're going to be stronger than we were before...I want the people of New York to be an example to the rest of the country, and the rest of the world, that terrorism can't stop us." Giuliani was widely praised for his strong leadership and close involvement with the rescue and recovery efforts.

As an avid and public fan of the New York Yankees, who won four World Series Championships during his time as mayor, Giuliani has frequently been sighted in field-level seating at Yankee games, often accompanied by his son. On September 21, 2001, the first game was played in New York City since the attacks, with the New York Mets at home facing the Atlanta Braves. Despite being a Yankee fan, the crowd cheered for him for his leadership over the preceding days.

Effect on 2001 local elections
The 9/11 attack occurred on the scheduled date of the mayoral primary to select the Democratic and Republican candidates to succeed Giuliani. The primary was immediately delayed two weeks to September 25. During this period, Giuliani sought an unprecedented three-month emergency extension of his term, from its scheduled expiration on January 1 to April 1, due to the circumstances of the emergency besetting the city. He threatened to challenge the law imposing term limits on elected New York City officials and run for another full four-year term, if the primary candidates did not consent to permit the extension of his mayoralty.

Advocates for the extension contended that Giuliani was needed to manage the initial requests for funds from Albany and Washington, speed up recovery, and slow down the exodus of jobs from lower Manhattan to outside New York City. Opponents viewed the extension as a means for Giuliani to profit politically from the sudden, international prominence of the role of New York City Mayor. Although a provision for emergency extensions is written into the New York State Constitution (Article 3 Section 25) , leaders in the State Assembly and Senate indicated that they did not believe the extension was necessary and the election and inauguration proceeded as scheduled.

Time Person of the Year
In 2001, TIME magazine named Giuliani Person of the Year . TIME observed that, prior to 9/11, the public image of Giuliani had been that of a rigid, self-righteous, ambitious politician. After 9/11, and perhaps owing also to his bout with cancer, his public image had been reformed to that of a man who could be counted on to unite a city in the midst of its greatest crisis.

At the same time, however, voices were being raised against the refrain that it was the mayor who had pulled the city together. "You didn't bring us together, our pain brought us together and our decency brought us together. We would have come together if Bozo was the mayor," said civil-rights activist Al Sharpton, in a statement largely supported by Fernando Ferrer, one of three main candidates for the mayoralty at the end of 2001 .

Post-mayoralty

Consulting

After leaving the mayor's office, Giuliani built a security consulting business and gave speeches. On December 1, 2004 his consulting firm announced it purchased accounting firm Ernst & Young's investment banking unit. The new investment bank will be known as Giuliani Capital Advisors LLC and will advise companies on acquisitions, restructurings and other strategic issues.

Commercial endorsement

Giuliani and Giuliani Partners struck a deal to promote a wireless communication company called Nextel. *

2004

Giuliani, who campaigned on behalf of the re-election of George W. Bush in the 2004 election, was reportedly the top choice for Secretary of Homeland Security after the resignation of Tom Ridge. Giuliani turned down the offer and instead recommended his friend and former New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik. Kerik in his pre-announcement interviews with the White House failed to disclose facts in his past which were certain to disqualify him. After the formal announcement of Kerik's nomination, information known for years to local reporters, but unreported, became widely known. The political fallout was damaging to the perception of competence in the White House vetting process and doubts as to the political judgment of Giuliani in recommending Kerik in the first place.

2005

On March 31, 2005, it was announced that Giuliani would join the firm of Bracewell & Patterson LLP (renamed Bracewell & Giuliani LLP) as a name partner and symbolic head of the expanding firm's new New York office. Despite a busy schedule the former mayor is known to be highly active in the day to day business of the Texas-based law firm. While there was early speculation that the firm would merge with Giuliani Partners, this is a legal impossibility (As a matter of ethics, lawyers cannot share legal fees with non-lawyers). However, while the firm is completely independent of the consulting business, the two entities maintain a close strategic partnership.

2006

Some have speculated that Giuliani might become a candidate for statewide office in 2006, either for the United States Senate challenging incumbent Hillary Clinton, or for Governor of New York; on July 27, 2005, current Governor George Pataki announced that he would not seek re-election for a fourth term. The consensus of political observers then was that Giuliani would not run even though polls show that he would be favored in a matchup against likely Democratic nominee Eliot Spitzer *; in any case, a Giuliani spokesman says that he "has no intention" of running, leaving no clear favorite among Republicans. With Giuliani staying out of the Senate race, the Republican nomination has been contested among several lesser-known candidates, with none gaining much traction and several dropping out (see New York U.S. Senate election, 2006).

On March 15, 2006, Congress announced the formation of the Iraq Study Group (ISG), of which Giuliani is a member. The ISG is a bi-partisan task force charged to assess the ground situation in Iraq and is organized by U.S. Institute of Peace.

On May 12, 2006, Cinema Libre Studio is scheduled to theatrically release GIULIANI TIME [http://giulianitime.com/, a critical, feature-length documentary about Giuliani's personal and political history.

Anticipated 2008 presidential campaign

Giuliani is widely reported to be considering a run for the Presidency in 2008. Supporters point to his leadership of New York City during the 9/11 attacks and his coordination of the emergency response in the immediate aftermath, as well as his track record of success in reducing crime and improving the economy of New York City. The prospect of a Republican candidate doing well in New York is also something of a tantalizing strategic prospect for the Republican Party, as New York has historically been an overwhelmingly Democratic state.

A significant obstacle Giuliani would need to overcome in order to win a primary would be his pro-choice stand on abortion. Pro-life groups, such as the Republican National Coalition for Life, have already announced their intention to oppose Giuliani or any other pro-choice candidate , though anecdotal evidence suggests that even among these voters, he enjoys some support. NBC host Chris Matthews and syndicated columnist Kathleen Parker believe that in South Carolina, an early Southern state on the Republican primary calendar, abortion will not be a deciding political issue.* Indeed, a recent Rasmussen Reports poll indicates that Giuliani is viewed favorably among Republicans by a 63% to 17% margin. Early 2008 Presidential polls show him with one of the highest levels of name recognition and support. But, as the years since 9/11 pass, many New Yorkers have recalled their dislike of his style of management and would, most probably, not support Giuliani's future pollitical ambitions.

Even if Giuliani can overcome his relatively liberal record on social issues such as gun control, gay marriage, and abortion, other aspects of his past could be major issues in a presidential campaign. Giuliani's relationship with Judith Nathan, later to become his third wife, was well-publicized by local media, as it appears to have begun before the divorce of his second wife was legally finalized. Mr. Giuliani, before his divorce, called Judith Nathan, his "very good friend." On May 10, 2000 Mr. Giuliani announced at a press conference that he was seeking a separation from his wife, Donna Hanover -- without first informing her of his decision. Mr. Giuliani went out of his way to praise Judith Nathan as a "very, very fine woman," and said about his marriage with Donna Hanover: "Over the course of some period of time in many ways, we've grown to live independent and separate lives." The mayor's assertion was contradicted three hours later by his emotionally distraught wife, who said, "I had hoped that we could keep this marriage together. For several years, it was difficult to participate in Rudy's public life because of his relationship with one staff member." Ms. Hanover was referring to Cristyne Lategano-Nicholas, the mayor's former communications director. The mayor and Ms. Lategano-Nicholas denied those allegations in the past, and continue to deny them now.

In Copenhagen, Denmark on October 2, 2005, initiating speculation as to his presidential ambitions in 2008, Giuliani said, "I will be considering it next year." In the latest 2008-related poll, taken by the American Polling Research Institute (March 26-28, 2006), among registered Republicans, Giuliani ties with John McCain for second place with 20% of the vote, while Condoleezza Rice leads with 29%. Trailing, are Newt Gingrich (8%), George Allen (6%), Mitt Romney (4%), Bill Frist (3%), and Mike Huckabee (1%). Eight percent were listed as "Unsure".

Draft Rudy Giuliani for President, Inc., * registered with Federal Election Commission in October 2005 to become the first federal committee formed with the sole purpose of encouraging former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani to run for President of the United States in 2008. As of May 2006, it remained the only federal committee formed for this reason. By law, Draft Rudy Giuliani for President cannot coordinate its activities with the former mayor.

Electoral history

  • 1997 Race for Mayor (New York City)

  • 1993 Race for Mayor (New York City)
    • Rudy Giuliani (R), 49%
    • David Dinkins (D) (inc.), 46%

  • 1989 Race for Mayor (New York City)

Further reading

See also

External links

Notes

1944 births | District attorneys | Italian-Americans | Sicilian-Americans | Knights Commander of the Order of the British Empire | Living people | Mayors of New York City | New York politicians | Notable baseball fans | Pro-choice politicians | Prostate cancer survivors | Roman Catholic politicians | September 11, 2001 attacks | Time magazine Persons of the Year | Members of the Trilateral Commission

Rudolph Giuliani | Rudolph Giuliani | Rudolph Giuliani | Rudolph Giuliani | רודולף ג'וליאני | Rudy Giuliani | ルドルフ・ジュリアーニ | Rudolph Giuliani | Rudolph Giuliani | Rudolph Giuliani | Rudy Giuliani | 鲁道夫·朱利安尼

 

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the "Rudy Giuliani".

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