When he needed someone to help incite the terrorist mob that would occupy the venerable seat of American government Wednesday, President Donald Trump turned to a trusted destructive ally with experience in that sort of thing.
Rudy Giuliani’s criminal fingerprints are all over this calamity just as they are on the coffee mug he uses when he’s washing down his morning bagel, or the cigar he holds when he’s blowing a more traditional kind of smoke.
The president’s personal lawyer was Trump’s warmup act at a Washington, D.C., rally to protest baseless voting fraud claims as lawmakers were gathering on Capitol Hill to certify Joe Biden’s election win.
“So over the next 10 days, we get to see the machines that are crooked, the ballots that are fraudulent. And if we are wrong we will be made fools of. But if we are right, a lot of them will go to jail,” Giuliani thundered.
“So let’s have trial by combat. I’m willing to stake my reputation, the president is willing to stake his reputation on the fact that we’re going to find criminality there.”
All together, now: What reputation?
If it wasn’t already in tatters, Giuliani did himself — and the country — no favors when he helped subvert the Constitution by encouraging an assault on the U.S. Capitol by Confederate flag-waving, MAGA hat-wearing mobsters hellbent on anarchy and destruction.
The rally was an overcrowded theater filled with angry anarchists, and Giuliani walked in and yelled “fire” at the top of his lungs.
Sadly, this wasn’t Giuliani’s first time.
In 1992, in the months before his election rematch against the city’s first Black mayor, David Dinkins, Giuliani lit the fuse that exploded into a riot at City Hall.
On Sept. 16, 1992, nearly 10,000 demonstrators blocked traffic in downtown Manhattan, assaulted bystanders and destroyed thousands of dollars in private property, according to reports at the time.
Many of the protesters stormed the steps of City Hall and occupied the building before marching to the Brooklyn Bridge, where they blocked traffic in both directions, terrorized motorists and stomped and rocked cars, including one driven by Mary Pinkett, a Black member of the city council driving with two elderly passengers.
Una Clarke, another Black city council member, said she was blocked from crossing Broadway by one of the demonstrators, according to a report at the time.
The goon turned to a fellow protester.
“This n—-r says she’s a member of the City Council,” he said, according to the report.
The beer-guzzling, gun-carrying protesters were given nearly free rein by the NYPD. Why? Because, as the media later discovered, most of the rioters were white off-duty cops protesting Dinkins’ call for a Civilian Complaint Review Board and his creation of a commission to investigate police misconduct.
And who was holding the bullhorn egging them on like a manager at Wrestlemania? The same man warming up the president on his darkest day in office.
Leonard Greene is a reporter and columnist for the New York Daily News.
