DOJ Says No Immunity: Another E. Jean Carroll Lawsuit Against Trump Can Go Forward

AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.On Tuesday, the Department of Justice reversed itself and said it would not oppose a lawsuit filed in federal court by writer E. Jean Carroll against former President Donald Trump for defamation. The trial is set to begin in January 2024.
The lawsuit accuses Trump of defaming Carroll when the former president called her a liar and said she wasn’t his “type” after Carroll went public with accusations of rape. Trump made the comments while acting as president—in fact, he made his initial comments about Carroll while seated at the Resolute desk in the Oval Office. He told reporters in July 2019 that her story was “totally false” and denied ever having met her.
Previously the DOJ said that it would fight Carroll’s lawsuit, a position that began under the Trump administration. Since then, lawyers have argued over whether or not Trump had immunity. Sitting presidents have some immunity from lawsuits for things they do while serving and the DOJ initially claimed that Trump made his comments in his role as president. After Trump left office, the Biden DOJ continued the argument. But in a filing with the court on Tuesday, DOJ attorneys wrote that they had concluded that Trump wasn’t actually serving the country with his comments—even if he was at work when he made them.
“Here, although the statements themselves were made in a work context, the allegations that prompted the statements related to a purely personal incident: an alleged sexual assault that occurred decades prior to Mr. Trump’s Presidency,” DOJ attorneys wrote, and then noted: “That sexual assault was obviously not job-related.”
Last year, after Trump repeated his comments, almost verbatim, Carroll sued him again. The case quickly went to trial. In May, a federal jury in New York City awarded Carroll $5 million. They found that it was more likely than not Trump had sexually assaulted Carroll and then defamed her by denying the story.
The fact that Carroll has already won an almost identical case is a bad sign for Trump, but he has shown no signs of backing down from his comments. Shortly after the jury verdict, Trump talked about the case at a CNN town hall event in New Hampshire, where he called Carroll “a whack-job.” Following Trump’s comments at the CNN town hall, Carroll amended the 2019 lawsuit to ask for more damages.
On Wednesday, Trump took to his Truth Social social media platform to rage against the DOJ’s decision.
“The Carroll civil case against me is a Miscarriage of Justice and a total Scam.” he wrote, Trump went on to rehash complaints he had made about the trial, mainly his claim that he had not been allowed to testify, which, during the trial, his attorneys repeatedly assured the judge was Trump’s own decision.