Supreme Court rejects Trump's appeal of 2022 E. Jean Carroll defamation case

(WASHINGTON) -- The Supreme Court has denied President Donald Trump's appeal of the $5 million jury finding in the 2022 defamation case brought against him by the writer E. Jean Carroll. 

The decision means the judgment against Trump stands and that he will have to pay it.

A New York jury in 2023 awarded Carroll $5 million in damages after it found Trump liable for sexually abusing her in the dressing room of a Bergdorf Goodman department store in Manhattan in the mid-1990s, and for defaming her in 2022 when he denied the allegations by calling them "a Hoax and a lie" and saying, "This woman is not my type!"

Responding to Monday's decision, Carroll's attorney, Roberta Kaplan, said in a statement, "Today's Supreme Court decision affirms once and for all the jury's unanimous verdict that President Donald J. Trump sexually assaulted and defamed E. Jean Carroll. His multiple efforts to appeal that verdict have all failed and today's ruling ends his quest to avoid accountability for his actions."

Trump had argued that the judge in the case should not have allowed the jury to view an excerpt from the infamous "Access Hollywood" tape, in which Trump is heard describing lewd behavior that he downplayed as "locker room talk." 

Trump also faulted the trial judge for allowing testimony from two women -- Jessica Leeds and Natasha Stoynoff -- who claimed that Trump had sexually assaulted them, which Trump denies.

A federal appeals court said the evidence was properly admitted and, even if it wasn't, there was no major harm to Trump. 

"The petition does not challenge -- indeed, does not mention -- the Second Circuit's holding that were there any error here, it did not prejudice petitioner," Kaplan argued.

Trump is also appealing a separate but related defamation judgment involving Carroll that ordered him to pay $83 million.

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