The GOP's top lawyer said Rudy Giuliani's 2020 election lawsuits were 'a joke' and 'are getting laughed out of court'
- The Washington Post obtained an email showing division within the GOP over the 2020 election.
- The Republican National Committee's top lawyer criticized lawsuits disputing the election results.
- Sources told The Post that Rudy Giuliani retaliated by trying to have the lawyer fired.
While Donald Trump and his allies made false claims of voter fraud after the 2020 election, a top Republican lawyer complained those claims were "getting laughed out of court."
In a November email obtained by The Washington Post, Justin Riemer, the chief counsel at the Republican National Committee, urged a party representative not to amplify the charges being made by Rudy Giuliani and Jenna Ellis, who filed dozens of lawsuits seeking to overturn Joe Biden's victory.
"What Rudy and Jenna are doing is a joke and they are getting laughed out of court," Riemer wrote in the email to the RNC's Liz Harrington. "They are misleading millions of people who have wishful thinking that the president is going to somehow win this thing."
Unnamed sources told The Post that Giuliani and other Trump allies tried to have Riemer fired.
In a statement provided to the newspaper, Riemer portrayed his criticism as legalistic. Before his role as chief counsel, Riemer worked as a lawyer for the Department of Education under Trump.
"I will say publicly now what I then said privately: I take issue with individuals who brought lawsuits that did not serve President Trump well and did not give him the best chance in court," he said.
Some lawyers who sought to overturn the 2020 election result are facing the prospect of legal repercussions.
At a hearing on Monday, a federal judge, Linda Parker, said she was concerned that Sidney Powell and L. Lin Wood - pro-Trump conspiracy theorists - had pushed false and "bad faith" claims in court that they had not bothered to research. The lawyers, who sought to nullify Biden's win in Michigan, face unspecified legal sanctions.