The US Supreme Court on Monday rejected President Donald Trump’s request to reconsider its earlier decision declining to hear his appeal of a $5 million verdict awarded to E. Jean Carroll, who accused the former magazine columnist of sexual abuse and defamation.
The justices’ decision marks the second time the Supreme Court has rebuffed Trump’s efforts to challenge the 2023 jury verdict. The court previously declined to hear his appeal in June.
The unsigned order provided no explanation. The Supreme Court rarely grants requests seeking reconsideration of its decisions.
Trump’s lawyers have argued that the trial was unfair and have sought to overturn the verdict stemming from Carroll’s allegations that Trump raped her in the 1990s in a dressing room at a Manhattan department store.
The Supreme Court is separately considering Trump’s appeal of an $83.3 million jury verdict awarded to Carroll in a different defamation case. That verdict relates to statements Trump made in 2019, when he denied Carroll’s allegations and accused her of lying.
Trump’s lawyers argue in that case that presidential immunity protects him from Carroll’s claims and that lower courts incorrectly concluded that he had forfeited that defence.
Carroll Cases Continue
Carroll, a former advice columnist for Elle magazine, has been pursuing legal action against Trump since 2019, when she published an excerpt from her memoir alleging that Trump raped her around 1996 in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in Manhattan.
Trump has repeatedly denied the allegations and accused Carroll of fabricating them, including in statements made in 2019 and 2022.
The $5 million case arose from statements Trump made in 2022, when he described Carroll’s allegation as a “hoax” and a “con job” on social media.
A jury in 2023 found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll and defaming her, but concluded that the evidence did not establish that he had raped her as she alleged.
After the Supreme Court declined to hear Trump’s appeal in June, Carroll received nearly $5.63 million from Trump, representing the original civil verdict plus interest.
In seeking reconsideration, Trump’s lawyers argued that the presidential immunity issue raised in the separate $83.3 million case could also affect the earlier verdict.
The Supreme Court ruled in a landmark 2024 decision that former presidents have broad immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts carried out within their constitutional authority. The Carroll lawsuits, however, are civil cases.
Leave a comment