Former President Donald Trump has filed a countersuit against author E. Jean Carroll, claiming in legal documents that Carroll’s statements on television defamed him.
The previous month, a New York jury found Trump guilty of sexually abusing Carroll in a Manhattan department store in the 1990s, but did not hold him responsible for her rape allegations. Carroll was awarded $5 million in damages related to his assault and defamation claims.
The jury also found that Trump had defamed Carroll by describing his allegations as a “hoax” and a “scam.”
During an interview with CNN on May 10, the day after the verdict, Carroll was asked how he felt about the jury’s decision not to hold Trump responsible for the rape. She replied, “Well, immediately (he said) in my own head, ‘Oh, yes, he did.’ Oh yes, he did.
Trump’s countersuit argues that Carroll’s comments were defamatory and contradicted the jury’s verdict, in which he was acquitted of the rape charges.
According to the former president’s lawsuit, those statements were made “with actual malice and ill will, with the intent to cause significant and spiteful damage” to his reputation.
Trump is seeking a retraction of Carroll’s statements, unspecified compensatory and punitive damages and reimbursement of legal fees “and any other relief” the court deems necessary.
A representative for the Trump campaign has yet to respond to requests for comment.
Robbie Kaplan, Carroll’s attorney, said Trump’s claim is “nothing more than his latest attempt to evade responsibility for what a jury has already determined is his defamation of E. Jean Carroll.” . He added that many of the statements in Trump’s counterclaim “were made outside New York’s one-year statute of limitations.”
Despite this, Kaplan says: “But like it or not, that responsibility is imminent.”
The former president has repeatedly denied allegations of sexual assault by Carroll and insists he never defamed her as he was only telling the truth. He has also claimed that he has never met Carroll and has refuted his claims by stating that he “wasn’t my type”.
In their closing arguments, Carroll’s lawyers responded by saying that Carroll was “exactly” Trump’s type and claimed that the former president did not appear at her civil trial accusing him of rape because she “knows what he did” to she
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