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The US Supreme Court declined on Monday to hear Donald Trump's attempt to overturn a $5 million verdict in favor of E Jean Carroll, the former magazine columnist who accused him of sexual abuse. The decision finalizes a jury's 2023 finding that Trump was liable for sexually abusing Carroll and defaming her, ending his appeals in the case.
The justices turned away the president's appeal after a lower court upheld the jury verdict and rejected Trump's arguments that the trial was unfair because the judge had allowed jurors to hear evidence of his alleged past sexual misconduct.
Coverage Comparison
The court's decision, reported by Al Jazeera and The Guardian, marks the end of a lengthy legal battle. The $5 million verdict stemmed from Trump's statements made in 2022, when he called Carroll's claim a "hoax" and a "con job" in a social media post. Trump also said "This woman is not my type!" in the same post, as noted by Al Jazeera. In the underlying case, Carroll sued Trump in federal court in Manhattan, with a jury awarding her $5 million in damages after determining that Trump had sexually abused and defamed her.
Trump's defense team had argued that allegations leading to the verdict were "propped up by highly inflammatory evidentiary rulings," according to Al Jazeera. Specifically, they challenged the inclusion of testimony from two other women who accused Trump of sexual abuse decades prior. The Manhattan-based communications including the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the verdict in 2024. That court ruled that the evidence displayed a "repeated, idiosyncratic pattern of conduct" consistent with Carroll's allegations, as quoted by Al Jazeera.
The appeal to the Supreme Court was Trump's final legal avenue to overturn the verdict. The justices did not comment on the decision, turning away the appeal without explaining what was part of their rejection.
Key Claims
- The Supreme Court declined to hear Trump's bid to overturn the $5 million verdict in favor of E Jean Carroll, a case in which a jury found him liable for sexually abusing the mind and granting defamation.
- Carroll first made her allegations public in an excerpt she published in 2019 for her memoir, in which she stated that Trump had raped her in around 1996 in a Bergdorf Goodman department store dressing room in New York City. This was reported by The Guardian.
- Trump has consistently denied the allegations, asserting that Carroll fraudulently made the accusations. The Guardian noted that he had denied the claims both in 2019, while serving as president, and again in 2022.
- The jury that awarded Carroll $5 million, also found her of having been defamed by Trump's social media post.
- Trump's legal team argued that the trial was tainted by evidentiary issues, particularly the testimony of two other women who accused Trump of sexual abuse decades ago.
- The 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals had earlier upheld the verdict, and the Supreme Court's rejection leaves that decision intact.
- In a separate trial, a jury awarded Trump's legal fees and $83.3 million in additional damages for defamation, as reported by Al Jazeera. That trial concerned separate defamation claims from Carroll.