The second day of E Jean Carroll’s New York defamation trial against Donald Trump was a picture in stark contrasts. It featured solemnity from the former Elle writer and flippancy from the ex-US president – who repeatedly taunted the judge with irreverent courtroom antics.
As has often been the case when faced with a strong woman who is clearly unintimidated by him, Trump’s volatility and proneness to childish outbursts of anger came to the fore.
But few of his numerous staunch female foes – adult actor Stormy Daniels, prosecutors Letitia James and Fani Willis and political rival Hillary Clinton being just a few – will have been in quite such close proximity to Trump and his temper as Carroll.
Sharing the same courtroom and just feet apart, Trump’s insouciance emerged when Carroll was on the witness stand, as she voiced his misdeeds, confronting him publicly, in a way he couldn’t control. He grumbled and muttered loudly and deliberately, like an angry child desperate for their voice to be heard.
“Mr Trump has been sitting at the back table, and has been loudly saying things throughout Ms Carroll’s testimony,” said attorney Shawn Crowley.
These snipes included remarks that Carroll’s claims were false and “she now seems to have gotten her memory back,” Crowley said.
“It’s loud enough for us to hear it,” Crowley told Judge Lewis Kaplan. “I imagine it’s loud enough for the jury to hear it.”
Before court started back up after the morning break, Kaplan warned: “I’m just going to ask Mr Trump to take special care to keep his voice down when conferring with counsel, so that the jury does not overhear.”
And yet Trump did not listen. Before lunch, Crowley told Kaplan that Trump was still grumbling.
“The defendant has been making statements again [that] we can hear at counsel table,” Crowley said.
“He said it is a ‘witch-hunt’, it really is a con-job.”
Kaplan did not take kindly to Trump ignoring his warning.
“Mr Trump has the right to be present here. That right can be forfeited, and it can be forfeited if he is disruptive, which is what has been reported to me, and if he disregards court orders,” he said. “Mr Trump, I hope I don’t have to consider excluding you from the trial … I understand you are probably very eager for me to do that.”
“I would love it. I would love it,” Trump remarked, gesturing.
“I know you would. You just can’t control yourself in this circumstance, apparently.”
Carroll, who already won a sexual abuse and defamation jury verdict against Trump in May last year, is confronting Trump in court during a second Manhattan federal trial.
Judge Kaplan has instructed jurors that this trial will only determine damages, having ruled that the underlying facts – that Trump sexually abused and defamed Carroll – were determined in that other case.
Trump’s antics appeared infectious to his legal team. His lawyer, Alina Habba, also seemed to lose whatever control she had in court, with the judge repeatedly telling her to sit down. Habba then annoyed Kaplan further by asking for proceedings to be adjourned on Thursday, the scheduled date for his mother-in-law’s funeral – even though he had denied this request on prior occasions.
Kaplan told Habba he would not entertain another argument on it. “None. None. Do you understand that word, none?”
He told Habba to sit. She did not.
“I said sit down.”
Habba did not, and said she wanted to bring up another issue.
“I don’t like to be spoken to that way, your honor,” Habba commented. “I will ask you to refrain from speaking to me that way.”
Kaplan repeated to Habba that her request for an adjournment was denied.
“Sit down.”
At another point during the day, Habba started to address the court while sitting down. “When you speak in this courtroom or any other courtroom in this building, you stand up,” Kaplan said stiffly.
It was no doubt a scene familiar to exasperated parents of angry toddlers all over America. But one less often associated with a courtroom. Less still, many might have hoped, featuring a former occupant of the White House. But then: Trump will always be Trump.
