- Rudy Giuliani is a knight. Yes, really.
- He could lose his knighthood following his push to overturn the 2020 election, insiders told The Daily Beast.
In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks in 2001, Rudy Giuliani was widely hailed as "America's Mayor" for his response coordinating with federal agencies and providing comforting rhetoric.
Queen Elizabeth II gave him an honorary knighthood several months later. Because Giuliani isn't British, he can't use "Sir" before his name. But he can affix "KBE," a reference to "Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire," to the end of it, according to British royal protocol.
Fast forward more than two decades, and Giuliani could be at risk of losing that honorary knighthood, according to The Daily Beast.
Earlier this month, a jury decided Giuliani owed $148 million in damages to two Georgia election workers he defamed. He declared bankruptcy in response.
The jury verdict is just one of Giuliani's many legal problems, which also include a criminal indictment in an election interference case.
Withdrawing an honorary knighthood is rare. If Giuliani loses his, it will put him in company with former Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe and Italian fascist leader Benito Mussolini.
According to The Daily Beast, the British government cabinet can form a Forfeiture Committee, which can consider recommendations for removals. Those recommendations would then be sent to Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, who would send them to King Charles III, who would then decide whether to withdraw the honor.
According to the British cabinet office, it will "automatically" consider recommending stripping someone of knighthood if they have been "been censured or struck off by the relevant regulatory authority or professional body."
That may apply to Giuliani, who lost his ability to practice law in New York after promoting falsehoods about the 2020 election and may soon lose his legal license in Washington, DC.
If Giuliani pleads guilty or is found guilty at trial in his criminal election interference case in Georgia, that could potentially fulfill the criteria of having "been found guilty by the courts of a criminal offense and sentenced to a term of imprisonment of more than three months."
Tom Brake, the leader of the democratic reform group Unlock Democracy and a former British parliament member, told The Daily Beast that Giuliani ought to lose his knighthood after trying to overturn the results of the 2020 election on behalf of former President Donald Trump.
"Anyone who tries to overturn a legitimate election result I think should not be worthy of an honor and a knighthood under the British honors system," he said.
But the issue is also a political one. If Trump wins the 2024 election, British authorities may decide it isn't worth antagonizing him.
"I think this ultimately boils down to a political question," Toby Harper, a scholar of the British honors system at Arizona State University, told The Daily Beast. "Does the British government have the political will to endorse, I guess, the ways in which American society or the American justice system has censured Giuliani?"