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E Jean Caroll; Donald Trump Photo illustration by Salon/Getty Images
Former President Donald Trump filed a counterclaim against writer E. Jean Carroll on Tuesday, claiming she defamed him after a jury trial found him responsible of sexual abuse and defamation of her last month.
While Trump was not held accountable for rape, Carroll has long claimed that the former host sexually assaulted her in a department store locker room in 1996. focuses on Carroll’s CNN appearance on May 10, a day after the verdict was handed down, in which she doubled down on the rape allegation. The lawsuit accuses Carroll of defaming Trump when she insisted “oh yes, he did, oh yes, he did,” when she responded to a question asking for comment on the jury’s ruling that Trump was not liable for rape.
Trump’s legal team in the filing argues that Carroll “made these false statements with actual malice and ill-will with intent to cause significant and hateful harm and attack,” and states that Trump “has been the subject of considerable damage to his reputation, which, in turn, resulted in an inordinate amount of damage suffered.”
“The interview was on television, social media and multiple internet websites, with the intention of broadcasting and disseminating these defamatory statements to a significant portion of the public,” the counterclaim adds.
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Carroll was awarded $5 million in damages last month, $3 million of which was allocated to damages Trump incurred by calling Carroll’s allegations an “imposter” in an October 2022 statement. The lawsuit that Carroll won last month was the second of two lawsuits the longtime columnist had filed against the ex-president. Trump’s counterclaim on Tuesday was in response to Carroll’s first lawsuit, which accused the former president of defaming her when she initially came forward in June 2019. That lawsuit has not yet come to court.
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Trump remained steadfast in his denial of Carroll’s claims during a May appearance at a CNN town hall, arguing that they were “fake” and “made up.” The ex-president denied ever meeting Carroll — despite a photo of the two together — and called her a “crazy job,” while referring to the trial as “a rigged deal.”
Carroll responded to city hall by filing an additional filing in Manhattan federal court asking for a “very substantial” additional amount from Trump over the comments.
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“Donald Trump again asserts, contrary to both logic and fact, that he was acquitted by a jury that found he had sexually assaulted E Jean Carroll…” Carroll’s attorney, Roberta Kaplan, said in a statement. “Four of the five statements in Trump’s so-called counterclaim were made outside the New York one-year statute of limitations. The other statement will also not withstand a motion to dismiss.”
“Trump’s filing, then, is nothing more than his last-ditch effort to delay accountability for what a jury has already determined to be his defamation of E Jean Carroll. But whether he likes it or not, that accountability is coming very soon.” Kaplan said.
MSNBC legal analyst Katie Phang called Trump’s counterclaim “truly, epically STUPID.”
“I don’t think it’s possible to convey in 280 characters or even 280,000 characters how stupid this is. Good God,” agreed conservative attorney and frequent Trump critic George Conway.
Conway added that the judge in the case could impose “Rule 11 penalties” on the counterclaim, referring to the establishment of a rule in which lawyers and parties submit pleas that are insignificant or cannot be firmly substantiated.
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about the lawsuit against E. Jean Carroll
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