Closing summary
Donald Trump took the witness stand in E Jean Carroll’s second defamation trial against him, marking the first time he has provided court testimony relating to her sexual assault claim against him.
Trump’s testimony lasted just a few minutes as the judge, Lewis Kaplan, significantly limited what the ex-president could say in court. The former president stood by his previous denial of Carroll’s sexual assault accusation.
Judge Kaplan admonished Trump for interrupting proceedings by talking while his lawyers were also speaking. When Trump grumbled that he had “never met this woman”, Kaplan told him to “keep your voice down.”
Carroll’s team called her former Elle editor, Roberta “Robbie” Myers, as a witness. Myers described Carroll as a talented “truth-teller” whose column was a “leader of the pack”. Carroll’s team also tried to establish that Myers did not have a deep personal relationship with Carroll, to undermine suggestion of bias.
Carroll’s team presented a handful of exhibits to jurors, including a television appearance in which Trump repeated a denial and an excerpt of an April 2023 video deposition in which he described his wealth. Carroll’s camp played one of the most shocking deposition excerpts of Trump, in which he mistook a photo of Carroll for his ex-wife, Marla Maples.
Trump’s lead attorney, Alina Habba, started the defense case by calling Carol Martin, a retired news anchor whom Carroll told about the alleged rape. Martin testified for Carroll in the first defamation trial, during which she said she had advised Carroll to keep quiet about the alleged assault. The defense tried to use this to undermine Carroll’s credibility.
Trump spent the hours before the trial resumed posting dozens of inflammatory messages on his Truth Social site attacking Carroll.
The court will resume on Friday morning to hear closing arguments.
Updated
While the trial is over for today, both sides are expected to come back later this afternoon for a charge conference which is where they’ll agree to how the jury should be instructed.
