Former President Trump faced another legal setback Wednesday, with a federal judge ruling that he is liable for damages in another lawsuit from writer E. Jean Carroll.
Carroll successfully sued Trump for defamation earlier this year, and Judge Lewis Kaplan ruled on Wednesday that her victory in that lawsuit will carry over to her lawsuit relating to Trump's 2019 statements about Carroll.
"The truth or falsity of Mr Trump’s 2019 statements therefore depends – like the truth or falsity of his 2022 statement – on whether Ms Carroll lied about Mr Trump sexually assaulting her. The jury’s finding that she did not therefore is binding in this case and precludes Mr Trump from contesting the falsity of his 2019 statements," the judge ruled.
Kaplan scheduled Trump's damages trial for Jan. 15 of next year.
NEW YORK JURY FINDS DONALD TRUMP SEXUALLY ABUSED E JEAN CARROLL IN CIVIL SUIT
The ruling comes roughly a month after Lewis dismissed a counterclaim by Trump asserting that Carroll had made false statements about him during the case that damaged his reputation.
Carroll has accused Trump of raping her in 1996 and sued him for defamation in 2022 when he called her a liar. She was awarded $5 million in that defamation case in May after a jury found that Trump had sexually abused her and acted with "actual malice" when he accused her of lying.
That jury's ruling will remain in effect for the Jan. 15 trial, which considers damages for similar statements Trump made about Carroll in 2019. Wednesday's ruling noted that most of the statements at issue were substantially similar enough to the ones for which Trump was already held liable in the other case, so there is no need for a jury to decide anything other than how much Trump owes Carroll for them.
Trump has dismissed his losses to Carroll as "a Miscarriage of Justice and a total Scam" on social media.
"The trial was very unfair, with the other side being able to do and present virtually anything they wanted, and our side being largely and wrongfully shut down by an absolutely hostile, biased, and out of control judge," he wrote in July about the previous case.
