Dem
47
GOP
53
In case you have forgotten, in 2019 Elle columnist E.Jean Carroll accused Donald Trump of sexually assaulting her in a department store dressing room in Manhattan in the 1990s. He called her a liar and she sued him for defamation. In 2023, a jury found for her and ordered Trump to pay Carroll $5 million in damages. Not only did he not pay up, but he defamed her again and she sued again. This time a different jury awarded her an additional $83.3 million in damages. For a detailed play-by-play account of the legal case, see this Wikipedia article.
Trump appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit and lost. Then he asked for an en banc ruling. On Friday, he got that one: It was 8-2 against him, with three judges recusing themselves. Judge Myrna Pérez, a Joe Biden appointee, wrote for the panel: "Simply re-litigating a case is not an appropriate use of the en banc procedure." The two circuit judges who voted in favor of Trump, Steven Menashi and Michael Park, were—wait for it—Trump appointees.
Trump's lawyers probably knew that from the outset, but he has an unusual legal strategy. He doesn't fight to win. He fights to delay resolution of all cases by continuous appeals until the other side gives up. However, Carroll's lawyer, Robbie Kaplan, is a human pitbull and never gives up. In a joint statement with Carroll, Kaplan said: "E. Jean Carroll is very pleased with today's decision."
Is the case over? Definitely not. Trump can appeal to the Supreme Court and almost certainly will. However, in his appeal to the Second Circuit, Trump's lawyers argued that the district judge should not have allowed as evidence Trump's bragging on the Access Hollywood tape that he grabs women by the pu**y, which is what Carroll accused him of doing. Her point was that he does this all the time and thinks it is normal. That kind of counters the defense argument that he would never do something like that. The Second Circuit had no problem with this evidence. Whether the Supremes will grant cert is an interesting question. The case doesn't raise any constitutional issues. It is a straightforward defamation case and not the kind of thing the Court normally takes on. Trump's lawyers will probably make a claim that the Constitution grants the president the right to defame anyone he wants to, thus making it a constitutional case. But will they buy it? (V)