Giuliani’s daughter details how she came to decision to break with father and endorse Harris
Rudy Giuliani pictured with his daughter Caroline Giuliani.
By Piper Hudspeth Blackburn and Rashard Rose, CNN
(CNN) — Caroline Rose Giuliani, the daughter of Donald Trump’s former personal attorney and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, said Wednesday that she did not come lightly to her decision to endorse Vice President Kamala Harris.
In her first television interview after endorsing Harris, Caroline Rose Giuliani told CNN’s Erin Burnett that she has had to navigate a painful “emotional storm” over the last couple of years, as her father contends with the fallout of his efforts to help Trump try to overturn the 2020 election. She said she had to figure out if she “had the fortitude to share” her thoughts, knowing it could hurt her relationship with her father, who is 80, “in the last years of his life.”
She said that she did not tell her father that she was writing an essay endorsing Harris over Trump, which Vanity Fair published earlier this week, but that she’s always made her opinions clear. Caroline Rose Giuliani previously endorsed Joe Biden and Harris over Trump in the 2020 election.
“I still worry that it will hurt him, and I do hope he knows that I love him. I hope that was clear, but yeah, we haven’t spoken about it yet and probably won’t for a while,” she said on “OutFront”.
In her Vanity Fair piece, Giuliani described being “well-suited to remind Americans of just how calamitous being associated with Trump can be,” detailing how her father’s life has crumbled since “he joined forces” with the former president.
“The last thing I want to do is hurt him, especially when he’s already down. Plus we never know how much time we have left with our parents. The totality of that makes this the most difficult piece I’ve ever written. Yet this moment and this election are so much bigger than any of us,” she wrote.
Giuliani said in the essay that Harris is the country’s “only chance for a better future.”
“Take it from me, Trump destroys everything he touches. I saw it happen to my family. Don’t let it happen to yours, or to our country,” she added. “Kamala Harris will guide us into a brighter future, but only if we unite behind her.”
Since the 2020 election, Trump’s former personal attorney has faced a slew of legal and financial troubles. He has pleaded not guilty to state criminal charges against him related to the election subversion schemes in Georgia and Arizona. Two former Georgia election workers, Ruby Freeman and Shaye Moss, have also obtained a $148 million defamation judgment against him for false allegations he made about them after the 2020 election. They are currently in court trying to force the sale of Guiliani’s property, including a penthouse co-op apartment in the Upper East Side of Manhattan and a Florida condo that are worth millions.
When asked on Wednesday if she’s afraid her father will go to prison, Giuliani said, “I mean, of course, that’s a terrible thing to think about, and it is a fear, and I don’t like to think about it.” She added that she preferred to think about the future and reemphasized her support for Harris.
Giuliani, the youngest of Rudy Giuliani’s two children with his ex-wife, Donna Hanover, supported Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election, while her father vociferously backed Trump. During the 2008 election, when her father was seeking the GOP nomination, she joined a Facebook group that supported Barack Obama for president.
CNN’s Katelyn Polantz and Tierney Sneed contributed to this report
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