Judge lets E. Jean Carroll add Trump’s post-verdict remarks to original defamation case
E. Jean Carroll, the former columnist who won a $5 million sexual abuse and defamation case against former President Donald Trump, will be allowed to amend her initial 2019 lawsuit in pursuit of millions more in damages,a federal judge ruled Tuesday.
Carroll’s lawyers filed the amended lawsuit in a New York court last month after Trump continued to verbally attack Carroll during a CNN town hall one day after the verdict was announced in the case.
“I have no idea who this woman [is],” Trump said during the presidential town hall, calling her claims “a fake story, made up story” and referring to Carroll as a “whack job.”
The amended lawsuit is separate from the one tried last month, in which Carroll accused Trump of raping her in a department store dressing room in the 1990s. In that case, a Manhattan jury found Trump liable for sexual abuse and defamation but did not find that he had raped Carroll. Trump, who denied the claims, called the verdict “a disgrace” and his lawyers quickly appealed.
A trial has been delayed for the initial lawsuit, as courts weigh whether Trump can be sued in his personal capacity over comments he made while president. On Tuesday, Judge Lewis Kaplan called on the Justice Department to make that determination by July 13.
“We look forward to moving ahead expeditiously on E. Jean Carroll’s remaining claims,” Robbie Kaplan, an attorney for Carroll, told POLITICO.
It’s another legal blow from Trump — whose lawyerssought to block the amendment — that comes the same day the former president was arraigned in a Florida court on 37 federal felony charges related to his handling of classified documents.
Erica Orden contributed to this report.