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President Donald Trump requested that the Supreme Court review a $5 million civil judgment that found him liable for sexually abusing and defaming writer E. Jean Carroll on Monday (November 10), CNN reports.
In 2024, a federal appeals court reaffirmed a jury's verdict finding Trump liable of sexual abuse in relation to Carroll's allegations that he assaulted her in the dressing room of a department store in Manhattan in 1996 and later defamed her by publicly using terms such as "hoax" and "con job" while denying her allegations in 2019. Trump's attorneys, however, claim that Judge Lewis Kaplan, who oversaw the civil trial, made numerous mistakes by allowing the jury to hear testimony from two other women who claimed to have been sexually assaulted by Trump years ago and said the judge shouldn't have let jurors see the infamous Access Hollywood tape in which the future president said he gropes and kisses women on a hot mic in 2005.
“There were no eyewitnesses, no video evidence, and no police report or investigation,” Trump's lawyers wrote in their filing to the Supreme Court on Monday. “Instead, 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,” the filing added.
It's not yet clear whether the Supreme Court will take up the civil case, however, it's unlikely it will be the last time the justices are requested to review litigation involving Carroll. A separate jury found Trump liable for repeating his statements in 2022, at which point he was ordered to pay $83 million in damages.
A federal appeals court panel affirmed the ruling, which it said was “reasonable in light of the extraordinary and egregious facts" and rejected several legal challenges made by Trump, which included finding that Trump had previously waived any claim of presidential immunity and said the Supreme Court's decision in 2024 involving criminal cases didn't alter their view.