Trump denies Carroll's sexual abuse claims as defamation trial nears end

Carroll, 80, a former Elle magazine advice columnist, is seeking at least $10 million over Trump's June 2019 denials that he had raped her in the mid-1990s in a Bergdorf Goodman department store dressing room in Manhattan. Last May, another jury ordered Trump to pay Carroll $5 million after he denied her rape claim in October 2022.

Donald Trump's testimony in the writer E. Jean Carroll's defamation case ended almost immediately after it began, as the former U.S. president stood by his earlier testimony that Carroll's claim that he raped her was a hoax.

"100% yes," Trump told his lawyer Alina Habba in federal court in Manhattan, when asked if his comments in an October 2022 deposition in Carroll's case were accurate. Earlier on Thursday, Carroll's lawyers played videotaped excerpts from the deposition, in which Trump called the former Elle magazine advice columnist "mentally sick" and a "whack job," and threatened to sue her.

"It's a false accusation, never happened, never would happen," Trump said in the deposition. Carroll, 80, a former Elle magazine advice columnist, is seeking at least $10 million over Trump's June 2019 denials that he had raped her in the mid-1990s in a Bergdorf Goodman department store dressing room in Manhattan.

Last May, another jury ordered Trump to pay Carroll $5 million after he denied her rape claim in October 2022. Trump spent only four minutes on the witness stand after U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan, who has overseen both trials, said Trump could not revisit that jury's findings that he had defamed and sexually abused Carroll.

Kaplan said he would not allow "do-overs by disappointed litigants." The trial has lasted four days, and closing arguments are expected on Friday.

(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)