Caroline and Rudy Giulani may be related, but this dad-daughter duo doesn’t see eye-to-eye when it comes to politics. Rudy was New York City’s former mayor and is now a personal lawyer of Donald Trump’s, and so his adult daughter Caroline caused a stir when she boldly titled her essay for Vanity Fair, “Rudy Giuliani Is My Father. Please, Everyone, Vote for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris.” Within the op-ed that Caroline penned three weeks before the U.S. presidential election, she touched on the political disagreements she’s had with her father since she was 12 years old, and explained why Americans should be voting for Biden and Harris.
In her essay, Caroline admitted that she can’t sway her father’s political stance but still believes the country can vote out the “toxic administration” that her father works for. She warned that “women, immigrants, people with disabilities, and peple of color” are “under attack by Trump’s inhumane policies” and his “judicial appointments.”
While recalling her old arguments with Rudy, Caroline wrote, “Even when there was an occasional flash of connection in these disagreements with my dad, it felt like nothing changed for the better, so I would retreat again until another issue I couldn’t stay silent on surfaced. Over the years other subjects like racial sensitivity (or lack thereof), sexism, policing, and the social safety net have all risen to this boiling point in me. It felt important to speak my mind, and I’m glad we at least managed to communicate at all. But the chasm was painful nonetheless, and has gotten exponentially more so in Trump’s era of chest-thumping partisan tribalism. I imagine many Americans can relate to the helpless feeling this confrontation cycle created in me, but we are not helpless. I may not be able to change my father’s mind, but together, we can vote this toxic administration out of office.”
Caroline even appeared on The Rachel Maddow Show shortly after the op-ed’s release, where she discussed her father even more. This TV appearance and essay arrived two months after Rudy called Harris, the Democratic VP nominee, “the worst nightmare as a prosecutor” while speaking on Fox & Friends First on Aug. 12, 2020. Now, learn more about Caroline’s conflicting relationship with her father, as well as about Caroline herself:
1. Caroline has been fighting her father’s beliefs since she was 12 years old.
“Around the age of 12, I would occasionally get into debates with my father, probably before I was emotionally equipped to handle such carnage,” Caroline wrote in her Vanity Fair essay. She continued, “It was disheartening to feel how little power I had to change his mind, no matter how logical and above-my-pay-grade my arguments were. He always found a way to justify his party line, whatever it was at the time. Even though he was considered socially moderate for a Republican back in the day, we still often butted heads. When I tried to explain my belief that you don’t get to be considered benevolent on LGBTQ+ rights just because you have gay friends but don’t support gay marriage, I distinctly remember him firing back with an intensity fit for an opposing politican rather than one’s child.”
As you can see, the daughter of NYC’s former Republican mayor is a proud Democrat — her Twitter bio once read “LIBERAL” in all caps. Caroline also shared a throwback photo that she had taken with Harris in August and wrote, “An excellent day for a repost from this bleeding [blue heart emoji] of mine.”
2. Caroline and her older brother, Andrew, appeared to become distant from their father after he divorced their mother. While Rudy appears to be on good terms with his children now, his family life experienced some turbulence when he split from Donna Hanover, the mother of Caroline and her big brother, Andrew, in 2000. He announced the separation in a news conference at the time, which “was allegedly a surprise to his wife” after 16 years of marriage, according to The Washington Post. At the same time, he essentially made his relationship with “friend” Judith Nathan public, whom he went on to marry in 2003 (they split in 2018, however).
In 2007 — when Rudy was married to Judith, and preparing to run for the 2008 presidential election — The New York Times ran a story that claimed Rudy would not be supported by his two children.
“There’s obviously a little problem that exists between me and his wife,” Caroline’s brother, Andrew, told the newspaper at the time. “And we’re trying to figure that out. But as of right now it’s not working as well as we would like.” Rudy, who was known for being active in his kids’ lives, also allegedly missed out on “his daughter’s plays in the last 18 months, said people who attended those events,” per the NYT piece.
3. According to Caroline, Rudy is okay with his daughter’s different political views. Ahead of the 2016 presidential election that pitted Hillary Clinton against Trump, Caroline revealed that she has no bad blood with her father over their conflicting politics.
“I love Hillary, I think she’s by far the most qualified candidate that we’ve had in a long while. My dad knows. I was for Barack [Obama] in 2012. He knows and is fully comfortable with it and thinks I have a right to my opinion,” Caroline told Politico in Oct. 2016.
4. She’s also a graduate from the most famous Ivy League school in the country. You guessed it: Harvard University! She graduated from the prestigious establishment with a degree in film production, according to her IMDb page.
5. She now works in the film industry. Caroline has worked as a production assistant on the television series 666 Avenue, Hello Ladies and Trophy Wife, and served as an assistant on the Netflix film Someone Great starring Gina Rodriguez and LaKeith Stanfield. She’s also been a producer on a handful of projects. Most recently, Caroline directed the 2020 video short, Richard Shelton: Lost & Found.