Appeals Court Denies Trump’s Request to Overturn Ruling in $5 Million Lawsuit Against E. Jean Carroll

A federal appeals court on Friday rejected President Donald Trump’s effort to overturn a lower court ruling in his $5 million sexual abuse lawsuit involving former Elle columnist E. Jean Carroll.

The decision came from a divided panel of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals, with all 11 judges participating en banc. The ruling upheld a December 30 decision by a three-judge panel to enforce the jury’s award.

E. Jean Carroll, now 81, accused Trump of sexually assaulting her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in Manhattan around 1996. She later claimed he defamed her with a 2022 post on Truth Social, calling her accusation a hoax.

In May 2023, a jury found Trump liable for sexual assault and defamation. However, the jury did not find that Trump had raped Carroll, as she had initially alleged.

Trump sought reconsideration, arguing the trial judge erred by allowing jurors to see a 2005 Access Hollywood video where Trump boasted about his sexual conduct. He also criticized the admission of evidence involving allegations from two other women.

Two Trump-appointed judges, Steven Menashi and Michael Park, dissented from the en banc ruling. They argued the Access Hollywood tape was improper “propensity” evidence and should not have been admitted.

One of the other accusers, businesswoman Jessica Leeds, said Trump groped her on a plane in the late 1970s. Another, former People magazine writer Natasha Stoynoff, alleged he forcibly kissed her at Mar-a-Lago in 2005. Trump denies both claims.

Trump, who will turn 79 on Saturday, is also appealing an $83.3 million jury verdict from January 2024. That verdict found he defamed Carroll by harming her reputation when he denied her allegations in 2019.

In this appeal, Trump argues that a recent U.S. Supreme Court ruling granting him broad criminal immunity should also protect him from civil liability in Carroll’s case, per the Conservative Brief.

In 2019 and 2022 statements, Trump denied Carroll’s accusations, saying she was “not my type” and accusing her of fabricating the story to promote a memoir.

Trump may also face a third lawsuit from Carroll related to a Truth Social post he made during Memorial Day last year.

In that post, Trump criticized the federal judge who presided over Carroll’s trials, calling him a “Trump Hating Federal Judge” and referring to Carroll as someone he barely knew who received $91 million for defamation.

Trump’s post also questioned Carroll’s account of the incident, mentioning she didn’t know the exact date, didn’t file a police report, and did not produce the dress she claimed was evidence.

He further criticized Judge Arthur Engoron, who fined Trump nearly $500 million for unrelated matters, calling the judge “wacko” and claiming he did nothing wrong.

Carroll’s attorney, Roberta Kaplan, told Newsweek that her client was considering another lawsuit.

Kaplan said, “We have said several times since the last jury verdict in January that all options were on the table. And that remains true today. All options are on the table.”

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