Appeals Court Affirms Verdict Finding Trump Liable for Sexual Abuse

(Left) Former President Donald Trump speaks during the Alabama Republican Party’s 2023 Summer meeting at the Renaissance Montgomery Hotel in Montgomery, Ala., on Aug. 4, 2023. (Julie Bennett/Getty Images); (Right) E. Jean Carroll leaves following her trial at Manhattan Federal Court in New York on May 8, 2023. Stephanie Keith/Getty Images

A federal appeals court has upheld a New York jury’s verdict finding President-elect Donald Trump liable for sexually abusing writer E. Jean Carroll in 1996.

The jury had ordered Trump to pay Carroll $5 million in damages for the alleged abuse and defaming her with comments he made in 2022.

Trump has repeatedly denied ever engaging in any sexual misconduct toward Carroll. He appealed the verdict to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit, arguing that the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York erred in several evidentiary rulings. The three-judge panel disagreed in its Dec. 30 ruling.

“On review for abuse of discretion, we conclude that Mr. Trump has not demonstrated that the district court erred in any of the challenged rulings. Further, he has not carried his burden to show that any claimed error or combination of claimed errors affected his substantial rights as required to warrant a new trial,” the judges wrote.

Trump’s attorney, John D. Sauer, had argued that the lower court erroneously allowed Carroll’s lawyers to introduce inflammatory and irrelevant evidence at trial, including an “Access Hollywood” recording of Trump making sexually explicit comments about women and the testimony of two other women who had previously accused him of sexual assault.

“This case is a textbook example of implausible allegations being propped up by highly inflammatory, inadmissible propensity evidence,” Sauer charged during oral arguments on Sept. 6.

Carroll’s attorney, Roberta Kaplan, argued that the evidence in question established that the behavior alleged by her client was part of a larger pattern for Trump.

Trump, who attended the hearing, shook his head as Kaplan spoke. He did not attend the May 2023 defamation trial—a fact Kaplan pointed out in making her case.

“[Trump] had every opportunity to take the stand and rebut all this evidence. He did not,” Kaplan said.

The appellate judges ultimately sided with the original ruling made by Judge Lewis Kaplan (no relation to the defense attorney), finding that the district court’s admission of the challenged evidence was appropriate.

“Taking the record as a whole and considering the strength of Ms. Carroll’s case, we are not persuaded that any claimed error or combination of errors in the district court’s evidentiary rulings affected Mr. Trump’s substantial rights,” they wrote, concluding that a new trial was unwarranted.

In response, Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said in a statement that Americans “demand an immediate end to the political weaponization of our justice system and a swift dismissal of all of the Witch Hunts, including the Democrat-funded Carroll Hoax, which will continue to be appealed.”

In a separate case decided earlier this year, a jury ordered Trump to pay Carroll $83.3 million in damages, finding that comments he made about her in 2019 were defamatory.

Michael Washburn and Reuters contributed to this report.