Updated

Updated · NBC News · Jul 14

E. Jean Carroll Collects $5.6 Million From Trump After Supreme Court Lets Verdict Stand

Updated

Updated · NBC News · Jul 14

E. Jean Carroll Collects $5.6 Million From Trump After Supreme Court Lets Verdict Stand

Q: With one multimillion-dollar judgment paid, what will decide the outcome of the separate $83.3 million verdict still pending?

The fate of the separate $83.3 million Carroll verdict will be decided by the remaining appeals, above all whether the U.S. Supreme Court agrees to hear Trump’s challenge and, if it does, whether it upholds or overturns the judgment. That case is different from the now-paid $5.6 million award. The $83.3 million verdict came from a later jury trial over additional defamatory statements Trump made about Carroll. Trump has already posted a bond covering that judgment, so the money is secured while the appeal continues. The key legal issues are narrower than the underlying facts. Trump’s lawyers are pressing arguments that he was protected by presidential immunity for statements made while in office and that the United States should be substituted as the defendant under federal law, which could effectively wipe out the defamation claim because the government cannot be sued for defamation in that way. He has also challenged how the trial judge instructed the jury, including requiring it to accept findings from the earlier Carroll case. Lower courts have largely rejected those arguments so far. The Second Circuit has already turned away further rehearing efforts, leaving the Supreme Court as the main remaining avenue. If the justices decline review, as they did in the earlier Carroll case, the $83.3 million judgment would likely stand and become collectible. If they take the case, the outcome will turn on their rulings on immunity, substitution, and trial-error claims.

3 articles · Updated · NBC News · Jul 14

$5,625,005.48 from a court escrow account has been disbursed to E. Jean Carroll’s lawyers, satisfying the 2023 jury award with interest more than three years after the verdict.
Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered the turnover earlier this month after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear Donald Trump’s appeal of the $5 million sexual abuse and defamation judgment.
Trump’s lawyers failed to block the payment, arguing Carroll might give away the money and make it unrecoverable if he later prevailed.
Carroll’s attorneys told the appeals court she instead plans to place the award in an interest-bearing account for retirement while Trump seeks Supreme Court reconsideration; a separate $83 million defamation judgment is still under appeal.