On January 26, a jury in New York ordered Donald Trump to pay more than $83 million in damages to E. Jean Carroll as punishment for repeatedly defaming her. Another jury had sided with Carroll in May and found Trump liable for both sexual assaulting and defaming her, awarding her $5 million in damages. But the former president continued to call Carroll a liar afterward, and so she sued Trump for defamation again and won in court again. This time, the judgment included a whopping $65 million in punitive damages, which was meant to deter Trump from repeating his false claims about Carroll. That deterrent only remained effective for 43 days.
On Saturday — one day after he filed to post a $91.6 million bond in order to prevent Carroll’s attorneys from seizing his assets while he appeals the verdict — Trump resumed defaming Carroll.
Noting the bond at campaign rally in Rome, Georgia, Trump once again called Carroll a liar:
I just posted a $91 million bond, $91 million on a fake story, totally made-up story. $91 million based on false accusations made about me by a woman that I knew nothing about, didn’t know, never heard of, I know nothing about her. She wrote a book, she said things. And when I denied it, I said, “It’s so crazy. It’s false.” I get sued for defamation. That’s where it starts.
(He actually hasn’t posted the bond yet; his lawyers have requested he be allowed to.)
Then on Monday morning, Trump was at it again, referring to Carroll as “Miss Bergdorf Goodman” — a reference to the department store where Carroll said Trump assaulted her — during an interview with CNBC:
Speaking on CNBC’s “Squawk Box,” the presumptive Republican presidential nominee claimed that the numerous judgments against him in New York will prompt companies to leave the state. They’re “the most ridiculous decisions,” Trump said, “including the Ms. Bergdorf Goodman, a person I’d never met.”
“I have no idea who she is, except one thing, I got sued,” he said. “From that point on I said, ‘Wow, that’s crazy, what this is.’”
“I got charged, I was given a false accusation and had to post a $91 million bond on a false accusation,” Trump added.
Trump also briefly referenced Carroll at a rally in Michigan last month, vaguely implying he did not know her.
Carroll has made it clear she would file another lawsuit if he defamed her again. Her attorney Roberta Kaplan has said that “all options are on the table” regarding additional lawsuits. In a statement on Monday, Kaplan added, “The statute of limitations for defamation in most jurisdictions is between one and three years. As we said after the last jury verdict, we continue to monitor every statement that Donald Trump makes about our client.” Another Carroll attorney, Shawn Crowley, also said in an interview last month that they were watching and listening, waiting to see whether Trump would start up again.
They didn’t have to wait very long.
