January 17 - Trump's trial in E. Jean Carroll defamation case

Donald Trump clashed in court Wednesday with yet another judge overseeing one of his trials – after the judge in his civil defamation case threatened to remove the former president for making comments that could be overheard by the jury while his accuser was testifying.

The exchange with Judge Lewis Kaplan was merely the latest in a string of Trump’s in-court fights during two civil trials in New York over the past several months, offering a preview of what’s to come if any of the former president’s criminal trials are held this year as he runs for president.

Meanwhile, on the witness stand, E. Jean Carroll told the jury how Trump’s statements after she went public about him allegedly sexually assaulting her shattered her reputation and led to an onslaught of threatening messages. A civil jury last year found Carroll’s allegations to be credible.

“I thought I was going to get shot,” she said.

Carroll will return on the stand Thursday morning as Trump attorney Alina Habba finishes her cross-examination.

The former president is not expected to be there watching, as Trump plans to travel to Florida for his mother-in-law’s funeral, and Kaplan declined to postpone the trial in his absence at Trump’s request again on Wednesday.

Here’s what to know from Wednesday’s court session:

Court has concluded for the day with Trump attorney Alina Habba's cross-examination of E. Jean Carroll.

Habba said she had about 30 minutes of cross-examination remaining, which will take place on Thursday.

Once Habba finished her questions, Trump walked out of the courtroom before the jury had exited, with Carroll still standing in the witness box.

Trump is planning to address reporters at his 40 Wall Street property in lower Manhattan.

Trump lawyer Alina Habba asked Judge Lewis Kaplan for a mistrial, arguing that E. Jean Carroll admitted to deleting threatening messages, which would be part of her claim of damages.

“I haven’t seen them and there’s no evidence of them,” Habba said.

Kaplan denied the motion and told the jury to disregard it.

Carroll confirmed she would delete threatening messages she received replying to her social media posts and to her email accounts. She stopped deleting them in 2023, she said.

Trump’s attorney confirmed that Carroll didn’t show the negative messages she said she deleted to the police or her own lawyers.

Habba asked Carroll if she thought the general public would believe her story right away. “I didn’t think who would believe or who would not believe, I just made the accusation," Carroll said.

Habba then asked Carroll if she wrote in the book that she felt her allegations were so "odd" that she needed to clear them up from the start.

Carroll’s attorney objected, citing the judge’s rulings ahead of the trial that the assault allegations had already been decided by a previous jury.

Trump's attorney asked Carroll if she was surprised there was backlash because of her article in The Cut.

“I didn’t look forward to backlash. I was surprised at the vehemence of the backlash,” Carroll said. “I expected there to be a reaction.”

Before an afternoon break in the trial, E. Jean Carroll testified there were about five hours between when her 2019 story containing the Donald Trump sexual assault allegations was published in New York Magazine’s “The Cut” and when Trump made a statement denying the allegations, in response to questioning from Trump’s attorney Alina Habba.

Habba argued in her opening statement Tuesday that Carroll's story fueled the harassment, not Trump's denials. 

People began sending negative and harassing social media posts to Carroll about the story before Trump made a statement, Carroll acknowledged on the stand.

Judge Lewis Kaplan called for a trial recess when Habba improperly began reading from one of those harassing messages before entering it into evidence.

After the jury left the courtroom for the break, Kaplan told Habba, “You should refresh your memory about how it is you get a document into evidence.”

It’s not the first time Kaplan has admonished Habba today. Earlier, he told her that in his courtroom and any other federal courtroom she needed to stand while speaking. And after Kaplan denied her earlier motion to not hold the trial on Thursday and the judge told her to sit down, Habba said, "I don't like to be spoken to that way."

Former President Donald Trump on Wednesday said he felt an obligation to attend “every moment of” the E. Jean Carroll defamation trial because, he argued without evidence, the judge presiding over the case is biased against him. 

Trump again lashed out at the judge for denying his request to postpone the civil trial. Trump had asked the judge to delay the trial to attend his mother-in-law's funeral, but as a civil defendant, Trump is not required to attend the trial.

“Now, because I want to be at this Witch Hunt 100% of the time and watch what is going on, my attorneys asked the Judge for a one day delay so that I can attend the funeral of my beloved mother-in-law, with my wife and entire family, tomorrow in Palm Beach, Florida,” Trump posted. 

“The Judge, angrily, and somewhat surprisingly, said NO, you can go to the trial, or you can go to the funeral, but not both. He is abusive, rude, and obviously not impartial but, that’s the way this crooked system works!”

E. Jean Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan finished her questioning of Carroll in the civil defamation case, and now Trump attorney Alina Habba is beginning the cross-examination.

At the end of direct questioning, Carroll said she wrote her advice column in Elle Magazine for 27 years — up until 2019 when the magazine ended her contract. It was the longest-running advice column in American publishing, Carroll said on the stand. Now she publishes her columns on Substack, an online publishing platform.

Carroll's attorney showed the court one of Trump's Truth Social posts about Carroll that he published during the trial Tuesday.

She asked if any of the assertions in Trump's posts were true. "About me? No."

Before the jury entered the courtroom for afternoon proceedings, Donald Trump's attorney Michael Madaio made a motion for Judge Lewis Kaplan to recuse himself from the civil defamation case, citing a “general hostility.”

Madaio pointed to an exchange Kaplan had with Trump before the lunch break after E. Jean Carroll attorney Shawn Crowley complained Trump could be heard commenting during Carroll’s testimony. The judge warned Trump that he could be removed.

“There was representations made by Shawn Crowley, who was your former law clerk, regarding some of the conduct by President Trump. You immediately accepted the representations. There was no opportunity for the defense to respond. There was no consultation of the defense,” Madaio said. “You made representations that President Trump cannot control himself, that he’s disruptive.”

"And there’s also been a general hostility towards the defense throughout this case," Trump's attorney added as the former president returned to the defense table.

No further discussion was had about that motion or Trump's behavior before lunch.

E. Jean Carroll explained how she thought last year’s verdict against Donald Trump would put a stop to his attacks against her – but then he continued to disparage her at a CNN town hall one day later.

“For a few glorious hours I thought this is it,” she said, recalling after the jury found Trump liable in the first trial last May. But then, “Mr. Trump went on a CNN town hall and repeated the same lies,” she testified.

Trump's attorney Alina Habba again objected to testimony about Trump statements outside the two from 2019 at issue in this trial. Judge Lewis Kaplan instructed the jury that statements Trump made at CNN's town hall the day after the trial verdict in May are still relevant to punitive damages in this trial and whether Trump acted with malice.

Some background about Trump's comments: At the CNN town hall, Trump claimed that Carroll made up the story and dismissed the verdict against him.

Trump continued attacking Carroll when pressed about the verdict at the town hall. “And I swear and I’ve never done that, and I swear to – I have no idea who the hell – she’s a whack job,” he said.

The jury saw Trump's comments to CNN's Kaitlan Collins at the town hall event the day after the verdict in their first trial. Carroll said she learned of his comments on CNN the next morning.

“I was sound asleep the night before. I went to bed very early,” Carroll said.

The comments at the town hall were different than his social media posts about her, she said. “He’s doing it to a large crowd and drawing laughs about sexual assault.”

Carroll took a long pause before telling the court how she felt hearing the laughs. “I felt worthless," she said.

Judge Lewis Kaplan warned former President Donald Trump that he could be removed from the courtroom if he’s disruptive following another complaint from E. Jean Carroll’s lawyer that Trump could be heard making comments during testimony.

Carroll lawyer Shawn Crowley said Trump could be heard commenting, saying things like, "It is a witch hunt" and “It really is a con job.”

Kaplan responded, “Mr. Trump has the right to be present here. That right can be forfeited and it can be forfeited if he is disruptive, which what has been reported to me consists of. And if he disregards court orders, Mr. Trump, I hope I don’t have to consider excluding you from the trial.”

Trump threw his hands up in response.

“I understand you’re probably eager for me to do that,” Kaplan said.

Reporters in the courtroom heard Trump say, “I would love it.”

“I know you would,” Kaplan said. “You just can’t control yourself in this circumstance apparently.”

The parties then left the courtroom for lunch.