Donald Trump has sued E. Jean Carroll for defamation after a jury found he sexually abused the former magazine columnist and defamed her.
In a counter claim filed Tuesday night, Trump alleges that Carroll defamed him when she appeared on CNN the morning after the jury awarded her $5 million in damages. Carroll was asked about the verdict finding Trump sexually abused Carroll but did not rape her as she alleged. Carroll said, “Oh, yes he did.”
In response to the new claim, Carroll’s lawyer Roberta Kaplan said in a statement, “Donald Trump again argues, contrary to both logic and fact, that he was exonerated by a jury that found that he sexually abused E. Jean Carroll.”
She added, “Trump’s filing is thus nothing more than his latest effort to delay accountability for what a jury has already found to be his defamation of E. Jean Carroll. But whether he likes it or not, that accountability is coming very soon.
The counter claim is the latest legal salvo in a multi-year legal battle between Trump and Carroll. Carroll first sued Trump for defamation in 2019 after he denied her allegation that he raped her in the mid-1990s in the dressing room of Bergdorf Goodman. Trump said he didn’t know Carroll and that she wasn’t his type.
She sued him again last year under a New York law that allowed a one-year window for civil lawsuits for survivors of sexual assault no matter when they occurred. Trump has moved for a new trial.
The 2019 defamation lawsuit is scheduled to go to trial next year, although there are still several legal issues outstanding. Carroll is seeking more than $10 million in damages in that case in part because Trump repeated statements the jury found to be defamatory after the verdict on social media and at a CNN town hall.
