Trump Appeals $83.3 Million Defamation Verdict in E. Jean Carroll Case to Supreme Court
Al Jazeera Staff
President Donald Trump has appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn an $83.3 million defamation judgment awarded to E. Jean Carroll, arguing that his statements were protected by presidential immunity. The Justice Department has filed a separate brief supporting his position.
Lawyers for President Donald Trump have appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, asking it to throw out the $83.3 million penalty a jury awarded to writer E. Jean Carroll in a defamation lawsuit. At the same time, representatives from the Justice Department filed a similar motion this week with the same goal.
Both sides argue that Trump's statements about Carroll — who accuses him of sexually assaulting her at the Bergdorf Goodman department store — fall within the scope of presidential immunity. Federal lawyers wrote: “Without this Court's intervention, the sitting President faces nearly $100 million in personal liability for conduct that falls squarely within the outer perimeter of his federal office.” They cited the Westfall Act, which protects federal employees from certain civil suits when the harm allegedly occurred “within the scope of employment.”
Trump's personal lawyers argued his statements about Carroll could fall under the precedent set in the 2024 case Trump v. United States. That ruling expanded the concept of presidential immunity. Previously, presidents were immune from prosecution for all actions within their constitutional authority. After the 2024 case, “presumptive immunity” was extended to anything that could be considered an “official act” of the president — a term largely left undefined. However, that precedent applies only to criminal prosecutions, not civil cases like Carroll's.
Still, Trump's lawyers sought to extend the 2024 ruling to civil proceedings. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan rejected that approach on December 8 last year. In the appeal to the Supreme Court, Trump's legal team argued that his statements about Carroll were part of the president's interactions with the public and the press, thus constituting an “official act.” They also accused lower courts of sidestepping the question of presidential immunity, which was not raised in the early stages of the litigation. Trump's team declared: “This is the first case in American history where a court has imposed compensatory liability on a President for conduct while in office.”
Over the years, Trump has fought two defamation lawsuits filed by Carroll. The first came in 2019, after Carroll said he harmed her reputation by calling her a liar about the alleged assault for profit. The second came in 2022, after Trump repeated the accusation that Carroll was lying. On social media that year, he called the lawsuit a “fake,” a “scam,” and a “complete con job.” Trump was no longer president at the time, having lost the 2020 election to Democrat Joe Biden. He was successfully re-elected in 2024.
The second defamation case was resolved first. In 2023, a jury awarded Carroll $5 million in damages, concluding Trump was liable for both sexual assault and defamation, though not for rape as Carroll alleged. The civil trial for the 2019 case reached a verdict in January 2024, awarding $83.3 million, largely in punitive damages. Carroll, a former columnist for Elle magazine, first publicly accused Trump of the behavior in a 2019 book. She recounted how he blocked her in a department store dressing room in 1996, pulled down her tights, and raped her. Trump denied it, saying, “This woman is not my type.”
In the years following the two jury verdicts, Carroll's lawyers accused Trump's side of trying to avoid payment. In June, the Supreme Court declined to hear Trump's appeal of the initial $5 million verdict — which had grown to nearly $5.8 million with interest. A federal judge later ordered that sum to be paid this month. It remains unclear whether the Supreme Court will take up Trump's appeal of the $83.3 million verdict.
