Rudy Giuliani joins Cameo, offering $199 messages to fans

Former New York City Mayor facing mounting legal fees from time as lawyer for Donald Trump

Former mayor of New York and dedicated Trump ally Rudy Giuliani may not be following in the footsteps of the reality-star-turned-president, but he’s arguably dropped a rung lower: offering personalised messages to fans for $199 on the popular site Cameo.

The Cameo service was launched five years ago as a means of facilitating contact between fans and actors, athletes and other celebrities, who respond to requests for birthday, congratulatory and other video messages.

“Hi, it’s Rudy Giuliani, and I’m on Cameo,” the former mayor – who earned accolades for his handling of the 9/11 attacks but has since been suspended from practicing law in New York and DC – says in an introductory video on the site.

“If there’s an issue of concern that you want to discuss or a story you’d like to her or share with me or a greeting that I can bring to someone that would bring happiness to their day, I would be delighted to do it,” he continues.

“It can be arranged, and we can talk through the magic of Cameo.”

He is described in his Cameo profile as “Former Associate Attorney General of the United States, Mayor of New York City 1994-2001, and Host of the Rudy Giuliani Common Sense podcast.”

Though it’s unclear when he first joined Cameo, Mr Giuliani tweeted a link to his profile urging people to connect with him on Tuesday at around 3a.m. East Coast time. As of Tuesday morning, he’d received two reviews on the site.

One customer in New Zealand, however, told Newsweek that he’d received a prompt response to a request last week.

Real estate Samuel Chatwin, of Auckland, shared the message on social media showing Mr. Giuliani praising the city and asking prospective buyers and sellers to contact Mr Chatwin.

“A lot of real estate marketing is very boring, and you see the same things over and over again,” Mr Chatwin told Newsweek. “I thought, ‘Why don’t I try something that is a little bit different, that people aren’t really doing.

“There were a lot of different people on Cameo,” he said. “But I have a lot of respect for RUDY Giuliani as the ex-mayor of one of the biggest cities in the world, and that’s why I chose him to do that little piece. It was quite cool.”

Mr Giuliani has faced a tough road since his time as mayor. He completed his third divorce in 2019 and, aside from his personal life, is facing legal and other backlash for his role in the Trump administration, during which he served as his fellow New Yorker’s personal attorney.

The former mayor is reportedly floundering under legal fees, named in a defamation suit from Dominion Voting Systems for statements and “disinformation” he shared regarding the 2020 election. He’s also facing multiple criminal investigations, though he has not yet been charged.

Further damaging to Mr Giuliani’s reputation was a 2020 incident in which he was filmed by comedian Sacha Baron Cohen for the latest Borat film and appeared to be reclining on a bed, with his hands in his trousers, in the presence of a young female “journalist” – later revealed to be Cohen’s co-star.