NYC jury hears opening arguments in trial to determine damages Donald Trump must pay E. Jean Carroll

A Manhattan federal jury heard opening arguments Tuesday in a civil trial brought by freelance columnist E. Jean Carroll against Donald Trump to determine how much money the former president will have to pay her for saying she lied about him sexually assaulting her.

A jury in a civil trial last year found that Trump was liable for the attack in a changing room at Bergdorf Goodman in 1996 and then defamed her in 2019 by saying she had fabricated the story to promote her new book.

Carroll is seeking $10 million in damages from the GOP presidential front-runner.

Judge Lewis Kaplan told jurors that this case was not a “do-over” of the 2023 trial and that they would have to accept the conclusions of the previous jury in determining damages.

The former president attended the opening of the trial on Tuesday, watching the jury selection and occasionally making faces when potential jurors were questioned about his political opponents.

At issue in the second trial are several comments that Trump made while he was still in the White House. In June 2019, New York magazine published an excerpt of Carroll’s new book of interviews with women around the country talking about the #MeToo movement.

In the piece, the writer detailed the attack, what she did in the aftermath and why she stayed silent about it for so long.

The then-president issued several statements denying that he had ever met Carroll, calling her a liar regarding the account and saying that she was furthering a Democratic agenda.

“I’ve never met this person in my life,” Trump said on June 21, 2019. “She is trying to sell a new book — that should indicate her motivation. It should be sold in the fiction section. Shame on those who make up false stories of assault to try to get publicity for themselves, or sell a book, or carry out a political agenda.”

The next day a TV reporter showed him a photo of him standing next to Carroll at an event.

Again, he denied knowing her and said her charges were false.

“Speaking from the White House, Donald Trump used the world’s biggest platform to go after Ms. Carroll to ensure that no one would believe her again,” Carroll’s lawyer Shawn Crowley said.

Her lawyer told the panel that for three days, the former president denied her allegations, prompting his followers to attack her on social media and in emails.

“Donald Trump’s followers latched on to her,” Crowley said. “In emails, texts messages and Tweets echoing Donald Trump’s comments that she should be raped, should be in jail, she should be dead.”

Carroll now sleeps with a gun, has a pit bull to protect her and lives in fear that one of Trump’s supporters will go after her, Crowley said.

“She’s afraid, afraid that some day someone is going to make good on their threats,” she said in her opening statement. “He destroyed her sense of safety; he destroyed her professional career.”

The lawyer said that after Trump’s comments Carroll’s career went downhill.

“Ms. Carroll was an exceptionally powerful writer. Much of that was ruined when Donald Trump decided to go after her,” Crowley said. “She stopped getting requests for freelance pieces. She stopped getting invited on TV shows.”

Trump’s lawyer Alina Habba told the jury during her opening statements that Carroll's reputation has never been better, showing a PowerPoint slide that said her social media followers have grown from 10,500 to more that 280,000.

“Her alleged emotional harm did not stop her from going on TV again and again and again,” she said, showing another slide of Carroll on different appearances.

Far from being damaged by her public dispute with Trump, Habba said that the writer has profited from it.

“She does not want to change her reputation. She likes her new brand and she has found a way to monetize it,” she said.

Trump’s lawyer argued that he should not be held responsible for social media messages and emails from his followers.

“When you make an explosive comment against a sitting president, you will spark a backlash both good and bad,” she said. “She’s basking in the limelight. People stop her on the street. She has become an advocate because that was her aim.”