A New York federal appeals court denied President Donald Trump’s attempt to have a court rehear his challenges to magazine writer E. Jean Carroll’s defamation and sexual abuse case – the latest in a years-long saga over the multi-million dollar jury award.
Trump had asked the court to replace his name, listed as the defendant in the case, with the United States because he made defamatory comments about Carroll within the scope of his first presidency – for which he has some immunity.
A three-judge panel on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit rejected the president’s appeal, declining to hear his latest arguments. It comes months after the president unsuccessfully tried to claim he had immunity from litigation as a result of the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling.
For years, Trump has been trying to challenge the outcome of two cases that stem from Carroll’s 2019 accusations that Trump lied about assaulting her in a department store during the 1990s. Trump has consistently denied her accusations and accused her of fabricating the allegations.
A spokesperson for Trump’s legal team told The Independent that it planned to appeal the decision.
“The American People stand with President Trump in demanding an immediate end to the unlawful, radical weaponization of our justice system, and a swift dismissal of all of the Witch Hunts, including the illegal, Democrat-funded travesty of the Carroll Hoaxes—the defense of which the Attorney General has determined is legally required to be taken over by the Department of Justice because Carroll based her false claims on the President’s official acts,” the spokesperson added.
In 2023, a jury found Trump liable for sexual abuse, but not rape, and thus had defamed Carroll. The jury awarded Carroll $5 million.
In 2024, a separate jury found Trump liable for defamation after he claimed he never met Carroll, that she made up her allegations to sell copies of her new book and that she wasn’t his type. That jury awarded Carroll $83.3 million.
Trump had asked an appeals court to overturn the $5 million judgment, claiming the trial judge erred by allowing testimony from two women who accused Trump of sexual misconduct and allowing his comments from the infamous Access Hollywood tape to play in court.
After the appeals court declined, Trump went to the U.S. Supreme Court – which is currently considering the case.
The president’s second appeal, which the court ruled on Wednesday, had to do with claims of presidential immunity that emerged from a Supreme Court ruling on presidential immunity from criminal prosecution based on official acts.
With another rejection from the appeals court, the ruling opens the door for Trump to ask the Supreme Court to intervene in the $83.3 million judgment.
In response to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals decision, Roberta Kaplan, a lawyer for Carroll, said she was “pleased,” according to a statement obtained by ABC News.
"E. Jean Carroll is eager for this case, originally filed in 2019, to be over so that she can finally obtain justice," Kaplan said.
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