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The Guardian - US
The Guardian - US
Comment
Moira Donegan

Trump is turning the organs of the state against his personal enemies. Look at E Jean Carroll

President Trump Meets With The Crown Prince And Prime Minister Of Saudi Arabia At The White HouseWASHINGTON, DC - NOVEMBER 18: U.S. President Donald Trump awaits the arrival of Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia to the White House on November 18, 2025 in Washington, DC. Trump is hosting the crown prince for meetings aimed at strengthening economic and defense ties, including the U.S. sale of F-35 fighter jets to Saudi Arabia. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
‘The deployment of the Department of Justice to harass and punish Carroll represents a grim fusion of two longstanding trends.’ Photograph: Win McNamee/Getty Images

Donald Trump is accused of raping E Jean Carroll, the magazine writer, in the dressing room of a Manhattan department store sometime in the mid-1990s. Trump denies this, as he denies all the sexual abuse allegations that have been made against him by more than two dozen women, but he was found to have sexually abused Carroll by a federal jury; later, another jury found that he defamed her when he said that she had lied about it. She didn’t lie.

Trump has vowed to appeal the rulings, but he’s so far been frustrated: a federal court panel declined to hear his appeal of one verdict, and the US supreme court has so far delayed a decision on whether to hear another of his appeals in the matter no fewer than 12 times. She won two judgments from Trump: $5m for sexual abuse and defamation, and more than $83m for defamation. The president has used his office to enrich himself so blatantly that he almost certainly has the money to pay her. But Carroll hasn’t seen a dime; it’s not clear that she ever will.

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