Judge orders Trump to pay $5.8 million in Carroll defamation case

A New York federal judge ordered President Donald Trump to pay $5.8 million to writer E. Jean Carroll on Wednesday, enforcing a 2023 jury verdict that found him liable for sexual abuse and defamation after the Supreme Court declined to hear his appeal.

U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan granted Carroll's request to disburse the $5 million in damages plus roughly $800,000 in accrued interest, money Trump had already deposited into a court-controlled account. Trump's lawyers immediately notified the court they would appeal the order, arguing in a filing that the funds would face an "unrecoverable loss" if released before their legal challenge is resolved.

"The president faces an unrecoverable loss since the money likely couldn't be recouped even if he eventually prevails," Trump's attorneys wrote in a Tuesday filing asking Kaplan to hold off on the distribution. Kaplan rejected that request.

The $5 million award stems from a May 2023 trial in which a Manhattan jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the mid-1990s and for defaming her after she went public in a 2019 memoir. Carroll, a former Elle magazine columnist now 82, testified that a flirtatious encounter at the luxury department store turned violent. The jury found Trump liable for sexual abuse but not rape.

Trump has denied the allegations and called the verdict a "disgrace." After the Supreme Court rejected his appeal in June, he said he would continue to "fight against this Weaponization and Lawfare Case against me, including the ridiculous claim of Defamation, with all of my power and strength."

The ruling enforces one of two civil judgments against Trump in cases brought by Carroll. A separate Manhattan jury in January 2024 ordered Trump to pay $83 million for defamatory comments he made during his first term, in which he accused Carroll of fabricating the assault to generate publicity for her book. A federal appeals court upheld that judgment, and Trump's lawyers have said they intend to ask the Supreme Court to hear that appeal.

Kaplan, who presided over both trials, required the jury in the second case to accept the findings of the first jury and only determine damages. Trump's lawyers complained that the judge's rules barred them from telling the jury the encounter never happened.

The legal battle has followed Trump through his presidency and reelection campaign, becoming a recurring flashpoint in his public statements about the judicial system. The combined judgments — $5.8 million from the first trial and $83 million from the second — represent one of the largest personal legal liabilities facing the president.

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