Carroll pushes back on Trump claim immunity extends to $83M defamation verdict

Source: The Hill

01/28/25 9:55 AM ET


Advice columnist E. Jean Carroll’s attorneys pejoratively likened President Trump to the Wizard of Oz in new court documents filed Monday as they pushed back on his claims that presidential immunity protects him from Carroll’s $83.3 million civil defamation award. Trump is appealing to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit the jury’s verdict from last year, which stemmed from Trump’s denials of Carroll’s story that he sexually abused her at a New York City department store in the mid-1990s.

The 2nd Circuit previously upheld the trial judge’s ruling that Trump waived any immunity defense by waiting too long to raise it. But Trump has argued the Supreme Court’s subsequent presidential immunity decision made clear the defense cannot be waived, so the judge must reverse course and wipe the judgment.

“There is no good reason to stretch the law of immunity beyond its breaking point—and erase the law of defamation as it applies to a president—simply because Trump acted the way he did as part of his personal vendetta against Carroll,” Carroll’s attorneys pushed back in their brief at the 2nd Circuit filed Monday.

Carroll’s attorneys said the lower judge was right that Trump waived his immunity argument and that the defense wouldn’t apply, even if Trump could still raise it.

Read more: https://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/5110355-carroll-trump-immunity-claim-defamation/