On December 30, 2024, a federal appeals court dismissed an appeal by Donald Trump to reverse a $5 million verdict that held him accountable for sexually abusing and defaming author E. Jean Carroll. This legal defeat comes as a significant blow to Trump.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan, New York City’s three-judge panel unanimously upheld the civil verdict of May 9, 2023. The judges concurred with U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan that there were no errors committed during the trial, either in admitting testimonies from other women who claimed to have similar experiences with Trump or allowing the jury to watch the “Access Hollywood” tape in which Trump is heard making lewd comments about women.
The case was initiated by Carroll’s claim that Trump sexually assaulted her in a dressing room of the Bergdorf Goodman department store in New York City in 1996. Evidence presented at the trial included Carroll’s disclosure of the incident to two friends immediately after it occurred, as well as testimonies from other women alleging similar encounters with Trump.
From the awarded $5 million, $2 million was in compensatory damages for sexual abuse and $3 million for defamation, after Trump described Carroll’s allegations as a “hoax and a lie” and a “complete con job” on his Truth Social platform. Although the jury did not find Trump guilty of rape within the strict legal definition under New York law, the appeals court noted that the jury had “implicitly found” that Trump had digitally raped Carroll.
At the original trial, two other women testified about their own experiences with Trump. Jessica Leeds claimed that Trump groped her on an airplane in the 1970s. At the same time, Natasha Stoynoff, a former People magazine writer, alleged that Trump forcibly kissed her during a 2005 interview at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida.
The panel of three judges dismissed Trump’s objections regarding the evidence and testimonies presented at the trial. The judges agreed that Judge Kaplan’s decisions were correct and that Trump could not demonstrate any errors that impacted his substantial rights.
Carroll first went public with her allegations in 2019. Although the statute of limitations for criminal charges had already passed, a 2022 law in New York, the Adult Survivors Act, temporarily allowed victims of sexual abuse to file civil suits regardless of when the alleged abuse took place.
The $5 million verdict is separate from a defamation case in January 2024, in which a different New York jury ordered Trump to pay Carroll $83.3 million. The jury decided that Carroll’s career as an advice columnist was severely harmed when Trump repeatedly called her a liar after she made her accusations public in 2019.
Trump’s legal team argued that the damages were grossly excessive and accused the judge of bias. However, the appeals court did not concur, finding no merit in Trump’s assertion that his comments were political speech protected by the First Amendment.
In response to the ruling, Steven Cheung, Trump’s political adviser, claimed that Trump had received an “overwhelming mandate” from the American people and called for an immediate halt to the “political weaponization of our justice system.”
Trump’s legal team may decide to appeal to the full 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals or the Supreme Court. This ruling follows Trump’s recent $15 million settlement with ABC News over a separate defamation claim related to the Carroll case.