Supreme Court rebuffs Trump’s bid to overturn $5 million verdict in Carroll case
The Supreme Court on Monday again rebuffed President Donald Trump’s bid to overturn a $5 million verdict against him in a case in which he was found liable for sexually abusing former advice columnist E. Jean Carroll.
The justices denied a long-shot request by Trump’s attorneys to reconsider their decision to let stand the 2023 civil judgment in the high-profile case. They did not explain their ruling.
The decision is not a surprise—the Supreme Court has not granted a rehearing since the mid-1960s.
Roberta Kaplan, an attorney for Carroll, said Carroll and her legal team were “pleased” with the outcome.
“As a result, the jury’s unanimous verdict that Donald Trump sexually assaulted and then defamed E. Jean Carroll is now final and cannot be challenged in any court,” Kaplan said.
The ruling comes after the justices in June declined to hear an appeal of the verdict. The decision left in place a 2024 appeals court ruling that affirmed the judgment.
A New York jury found Trump liable in 2023 of sexually abusing Carroll in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in Manhattan in 1996. It also found Trump later defamed Carroll.
The defamation claim arose from a Truth Social post that Trump made in 2022 after Carroll went public with allegations that Trump sexually assaulted her. Trump called the allegations a “complete con job,” a “Hoax,” and a “Scam” concocted by Carroll to sell her memoir.
Trump denies any wrongdoing and has faced no criminal charges. In a petition to the Supreme Court in the appeal, his attorneys called the allegations “facially implausible” and “politically motivated.”
Last month, Trump asked the Supreme Court to overturn a separate $83.3 million verdict against him for defaming Carroll in the wake of the $5 million verdict. The court has not yet weighed in on that request.
CORRECTION: A previous version of this article mischaracterized the jury finding in the case. The jury found that Donald Trump had sexually abused and defamed E. Jean Carroll.
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