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President Donald Trump has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn an $83.3 million judgment awarded to writer E. Jean Carroll.

The continuing legal battle is the result of Carroll’s allegation that Trump sexually assaulted her in a Manhattan department store dressing room in the 1990s.

With absolutely no evidence of a crime, and no certainty of when it happened, he was convicted. Then she claimed he had defamed her by publicly denying the accusation.

Trump filed a petition asking the justices to review the defamation judgment after a federal appeals court rejected his effort to invoke presidential immunity. His attorneys argue that statements Trump made about Carroll while serving as president were official acts connected to his duties and therefore protected from civil liability.

The dispute represents a new attempt to apply the Supreme Court’s 2024 presidential immunity ruling to a civil case involving statements made by a sitting president.

E. Jean Carroll Accused Trump of Sexual Assault

Carroll, a longtime writer and former advice columnist, alleged that Trump attacked her in a dressing room at the Bergdorf Goodman department store in Manhattan in the mid-1990s.

According to Carroll, she encountered Trump at the store and agreed to help him select a gift for a woman. She said the encounter eventually led them to the lingerie department and into a dressing room, where she alleged Trump sexually assaulted her.

Trump has repeatedly denied Carroll’s allegations.

In May 2023, a federal jury in Manhattan found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll and for defaming her in an October 2022 social media post. The jury did not find Trump liable for rape under the specific legal definition presented in the verdict form.

The jury awarded Carroll $5 million in damages.

That verdict was separate from the $83.3 million defamation judgment Trump is now asking the Supreme Court to review.

Trump Raises Presidential Immunity Argument

Trump’s latest petition centers on statements he made in 2019, while serving his first term as president, after Carroll publicly accused him of attacking her.

Trump denied the allegations, and Carroll subsequently sued him for defamation.

His attorneys now argue that because Trump was president when he responded to questions about Carroll’s allegations, his statements should be treated as official presidential conduct.

“The Second Circuit instead engaged in procedural contortions to avoid addressing Presidential immunity,” Trump’s petition said.

E. Jean Carroll Case Unprecedented Elements

Trump’s legal team is relying in part on the Supreme Court’s landmark 2024 presidential immunity decision, which held that former presidents have broad immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts undertaken while in office.

Trump contends that responding to accusations that could affect perceptions of a president’s fitness for office falls within official presidential responsibilities.

“Because accusations bearing on the President’s fitness for office are unquestionably matters of public concern, Presidential statements responding to press questions about such accusations are plainly official. This Court should say so,” the petition said.

Appeals Court Rejects Trump’s Arguments in E. Jean Carroll Case

The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Trump’s attempt to overturn the judgment, concluding that he failed to raise presidential immunity early enough in the litigation.

“Presidential immunity was not raised for the first three years of this case,” Judge Denny Chin wrote in the court’s April opinion.

Trump has also argued that the United States should be substituted for him as the defendant because the disputed statements were allegedly made as part of his presidential duties.

The appeals court rejected that argument as untimely as well.

“The fact of the matter is that no other defendant would be permitted to move to substitute the United States in his place, fifteen months after trial and the entry of judgment against him,” Chin wrote.

Two Juries Awarded E. Jean Carroll Damages

The legal battle between Trump and Carroll produced two major jury awards.

In the 2023 case, jurors found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll and defaming her through statements he made in 2022. Carroll was awarded $5 million.

A separate jury considered Trump’s statements from 2019, when he was president. In January 2024, that jury awarded Carroll $83.3 million for defamation, including compensatory and punitive damages.

The second trial did not reconsider whether the underlying sexual abuse occurred because Trump’s liability on that issue had already been established in the earlier case.

Trump continued to deny Carroll’s allegations and challenged both judgments through the federal appeals process.

The Supreme Court recently declined to hear Trump’s challenge to the separate $5 million judgment. Following the end of that appeal, the money and accumulated interest were transferred to Carroll, according to her attorneys.

Supreme Court Asked to Intervene

Trump’s latest petition asks the nation’s highest court to consider whether his 2019 statements should receive presidential immunity and whether the federal government should have been substituted as the defendant.

The Supreme Court’s decision on whether to hear the case could determine whether the $83.3 million judgment remains intact or receives another round of judicial review.

A petition for Supreme Court review does not mean the justices will take the case; the court accepts only a small percentage of the petitions it receives.

Carroll’s attorneys declined to comment on Trump’s latest Supreme Court petition.

The case also presents a potentially significant question about the reach of presidential immunity outside criminal prosecutions: whether statements by a president responding to personal allegations can qualify as official conduct protected from civil liability.

More Information

U.S. Supreme Court:
https://www.supremecourt.gov/

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit:
https://www.ca2.uscourts.gov/

U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York:
https://www.nysd.uscourts.gov/

Supreme Court Opinions:
https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/opinions.aspx

Federal Court Records — PACER:
https://pacer.uscourts.gov/