Justices let $5M civil verdict stand against Trump in Carroll case

Summary

• The Supreme Court declined to hear Trump’s appeal, leaving a $5 million civil judgment in favor of E. Jean Carroll intact.
• A jury found Trump liable in 2023 for sexually assaulting and defaming Carroll.
• The decision leaves standing a federal appeals court ruling that upheld the trial verdict.
• A separate $83.3 million defamation judgment in Carroll’s favor also remains in effect after surviving appeal.

The Supreme Court on Monday let stand a $5 million civil judgment against President Donald Trump in a high-profile trial in 2023 during which a jury found him liable for allegedly sexually assaulting and defaming journalist E. Jean Carroll.

The justices’ decision not to take up the case leaves in place a 2024 appeals court ruling that affirmed the judgment. Trump had asked the high court in November to set aside the verdict. The court did not offer an explanation about why it didn’t take the case.

In a petition to the Supreme Court, Trump’s attorneys called the allegations that he abused Carroll in the dressing room of a Manhattan department store in 1996 and then lied about it in a 2022 social media post “facially implausible” and “politically motivated.”

They also asserted that the trial judge improperly allowed evidence that prejudiced the jury.

“Carroll waited more than 20 years to falsely accuse Donald Trump, who she politically opposes, until after he became the 45th President, when she could maximize political injury to him and profit for herself,” Trump’s attorneys wrote in a filing.

The jury returned the $5 million verdict after a two-week trial in federal court in Manhattan. Jurors heard from 10 witnesses, including Carroll, who testified that Trump forced himself on her in the dressing room of a Bergdorf Goodman store following a chance encounter. Two friends told jurors that Carroll told them of the assault soon after it happened.

Trump denied the allegations, but he did not testify. His attorneys did not call any witnesses during the trial.

The defamation claim arose from a Truth Social post that Trump made in 2022 after Carroll went public with her sexual assault allegations. Trump said the allegation that he had assaulted Carroll was a “complete con job,” a “Hoax,” and a “Scam” concocted to sell her memoir.

The defense attorneys appealed the verdict, arguing that the federal judge in the case should not have allowed testimony from two women who claimed that Trump had sexually assaulted them years earlier and the use of an “Access Hollywood” tape in which he talked about grabbing women by their genitals.

A court of appeals panel found the trial judge did not err in allowing the evidence.

“The jury made its assessment of the facts and claims on a properly developed record,” the judges wrote in the ruling.

In a separate civil case in 2024, a New York jury awarded Carroll $83.3 million, finding Trump had continued to defame her. An appeals court upheld that verdict last year.