Katie Couric: We were talking earlier, Mayor Giuliani, about the scrutiny that you have to endure when you run for public office, so much scrutiny that it really turns a lot of people off from participating in the process and throwing their hat in the ring. You experienced this recently where all of the papers today, I couldn't help but notice are focused on the on your security detail which you dealt with last night during the debate. But I am just curious, are you completely comfortable with the way it was handled and the way the billing was handled for example?

Rudy Giuliani: I was very comfortable with it and really upset that it was put out two hours before a debate with the suggestion that certain agencies were asked to bear the cost of my security. When you had a chance to look at it, it took about 3 to 4 hours to go through all of the records. The story turns out to be a totally false story. This practice was going on in my first term as mayor. It didn't just happen in my second term as mayor. The police department paid for all of these expenses. But since the police department would sometimes be slow in payment City Hall would pay it first then the police department would reimburse every single penny of it and now we've been able to confirm that. So this was really, I know what this was. This story is five years old. It came out two hours before a debate. It's a typical political hit job with only half the story told ... not that second part told - that every single penny was reimbursed ... that all of this was public. All of this was discoverable. It was not done in a way that nobody could see it. But it was a typical - this particular case - it was sort of a debate day dirty trick.

Read article here

Comments for this post are now closed