Rudy Giuliani sounds ready to put his son Andrew on Mount Rushmore in a pathetic New York governor’s campaign speech

In a virtual news conference Thursday attended by fewer than 30 people — including the public relations consultants who hosted the event — former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani compared his son, who hopes to become New York’s gubernatorial nominee next week York to be elected, with Donald Trump, Teddy Roosevelt, Ronald Reagan and… himself.

Giuliani, who appeared to have encountered brief technical hiccups logging into the sparsely populated Zoom meeting, described Andrew, 36, as “tough as nails” and boasted that his boy was joined by Trump cronies and convicted felons Mike Flynn and Steve Bannon, who was charged with felony fraud in 2021 but pardoned by Trump hours before the ex-president left. However, Giuliani also said that Trump’s support of Andrew’s already slim odds could potentially hurt, claiming Trump withheld his blessing out of his own goodwill.

In rambling remarks, mostly centered on his own accomplishments in running New York City, Giuliani took a page out of today’s far-right script and aimed at liberal businessman and philanthropist George Soros as the root of all the problems facing the US today are.

“This crime wave is being bought, paid for and brought to you by George Soros, the main financier of Black Lives Matter, the Antifa police organization Antifa, the white Organization for the Killing and the Democratic Party saying that right now you are all racist,” said Giuliani.

Agency Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu via Getty

He called Democratic Gov. Kathy Hochul “pro-criminal” and disingenuously argued that she and “her friends in Albany … create crime.” He also claimed he was the only person who could fix things before seeming to quickly recall that it was his son, not him, in the race.

“Give me two weeks with Adams, I’m bringing crime to town,” Giuliani said during the half-hour performance, referring to recently elected Mayor Eric Adams, a former NYPD warden. “You give Andrew two weeks, he will [too].”

Jan. 6 Special Committee member Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), who has nothing to do with the upcoming primary called a “massive liar,” Giuliani said of his son Andrew, whose entire professional political career has been in it consists of working as the Trump administration’s “sports liaison” — was “the only one who can do for New York State what I’ve done for New York City.”

“It’s what a Reagan can do, it’s what a Trump can do, it’s what an ‘I’ can do,” he said, bringing the conversation back to himself. “The others can’t do that”

But when asked how his own success as mayor would affect his son’s qualifications for governor, Giuliani gave attendees a wild turn.

“Well, it’s true — he was a kid for most of my tenure,” the former mayor replied. “But I don’t know, do you consider a 15, 16, 17 year old as a kid? He worked with me on these things when I was mayor. Not only that, he worked with me afterwards. You don’t know that because the press doesn’t really cover me much anymore because I’m pro-Trump.”

Given Andrew’s age and relative lack of political experience, Giuliani argued that his son may be “too young to think he can’t.”

“That was true of Teddy Roosevelt, who was about six months old when he became governor,” he continued. “That applied to me. They thought I was too young… They don’t go by age… I mean, with Trump and Biden, one should be in a nursing home and the other guy looks like he could run the world.”

Andrew Giuliani has been blocked by NY1 and CBS from appearing in person at two out of three debates about his unvaccinated status during peak season. On Tuesday, the candidate was allowed to take part in a debate sponsored by right-wing broadcaster Newsmax – which has faced libel lawsuits for parroting Donald Trump’s false claims about “rigging” the 2020 election.

During his campaign, Andrew Giuliani has described himself as the most conservative candidate on the ballot who has opposed abortion rights and continues to unfairly insist that Trump won the last election. Last week he hosted a fundraiser at Trump’s golf club in New Jersey.

Among Democrats, Hochul is expected to win easily on Tuesday, beating Rep. Tom Suozzi and NYC Public Advocate Jumaane Williams in the polls. Among Republicans, Mike Pence-backed Rep. Lee Zeldin is viewed as the front runner, although the race, which also includes businessman Harry Wilson and former Westchester County chief executive Rob Astorino, is still strong, according to experts.

“Lee Zeldin is the clear frontrunner,” GOP consultant Chapin Fay told the Gotham Gazette. “He has practically all of the Republican Party’s state infrastructure working for him, and regardless of polls and publicity, that’s a massive advantage that will be difficult for the others to overcome.”

According to a poll released earlier this week, much of Zeldin’s support comes from upstate, while Giuliani is doing well in New York City and the Hudson Valley. Nonetheless, Hochul is expected to win the November general election by up to 27 points.

On his campaign website, Andrew Giuliani says he wants to “put power back into the hands of parents when it comes to their children’s education. This includes parental decisions about masks and vaccinations — a decision that should not be made by the government or school districts.”

Rudy said Thursday that parents need to be able to say, “I’m sorry, you can’t put a crossdresser in a five-year-old’s class and start teaching him how to crossdress. I’m sorry you do that at my school, my kid isn’t in school and I’m going to war with the school district.”

The contestant’s father also addressed issues such as the future of fracking in New York (“The fracking [opposition] is Taurus. It’s part of a green strategy to make us… communist. And bankrupt.”), corruption (“Albany is a cesspool. Andrew is great at cleaning cesspools.”) and Thursday’s Supreme Court decision on concealed carry, which related to a case involving two New York men being denied permits for unrestricted guns (“What was the verdict today? I just got off a long, long podcast.”).

Of course, one of several elephants in the room concerned Donald Trump’s past support – or lack of support – in the race, which will be decided on Tuesday. So far, Trump’s recommendations have translated into both wins and losses in other primaries. Giuliani admitted, “I think Trump is wondering if he would help or hurt… He’s not sure if his post here helps or hurts.”

He also departed from GOP orthodoxy when urging supporters to vote early, citing his own personal experience of the practice in the 2020 election.

“I know Republicans don’t like that very much,” he said. “We believe in voting in a day, we believe in paper ballots. I do. But since they have an early vote, do it. I did it last time because I had to work on the campaign for my friend Donald Trump.”

He then warned the New Yorker that his son appeared to be the only candidate worthy of leading them into the future.

“You’re going to make a terrible mistake if you don’t nominate him,” the former mayor said. “And you can come and torture me if I’m wrong. You can come and torture me if he doesn’t reverse this state in two or three years. It will be what I did, it will be what Trump did, it will be what Reagan did.”