A writer suing Donald Trump𓆉 took the stand Wednesday to tell jurors that the future president raped her after she accompanied him into a department store fitting room in 1996𒉰.
“I'm here because Donald ♌Trump raped me, and when I wrote about it, he said it didn't happen. He lied and shattered my reputation, and I'm here to🤪 try and get my life back,” she testified.
Trump denies E. Jean Carrജoll's allegations. He hasn't attended the trial thus far,🐬 but his lawyers said Tuesday it's still possible he could decide to testify.
Carroll, 79, has said she crossed paths with Trump at💟 the revolving door to Bergdorf Goodman on an unspecified Thu♋rsday evening in spring 1996. At the time, she was writing a long-running advice column in Elle magazine. Trump was a real estate magnate and social figure in New York.
She has said he asked her advice about selecting a gift for a woman, and sꦏhe went along, thinking the experience would be funny. According to Carroll, they ended up in a lingerie department, joked with each other about who should try on a bodysuit and went to a dressing room.
Then, she alleges, Trump slammed her again🐭st a wall, yanked down her tights and raped her while she struggled against him. She has said she finally kneed him of💖f her and fled.
Trump, 76, has said he wasn't at the store with Carroll and had no clue who she was when she first aired the story publicly in a 2019 memoir and accompanying magazine excerpt. In a post on his social m♔edia site Wednesday, he called the case a “made up scam.”
“Thಞis is a fraudulent & false story — Witch Hunt!” Trump wrote in his Truth Social post.
In other developments, the judge said Trump made an “entirely inappropriate” online statement about 𓆏the trial and warned the former president's lawyers that he could bring more legal problems upon himself.
As court was🧸 about to begin Wednesday, Trump — who has not attended so far — posted on his social med🐟ia platform that the case “is a made-up scam.”
He went on to call Carro🍸ll's lawyer “a political operative” and allude to a DNA 🅺issue that the judge has ruled can't be part of the case.
“This is a fraudulent & fal♏se story — Witch Hunt!” Trump wrote in his Truth Social post🤪.
Lawyers for Carroll — whose suit includes claimꦗs that Trump previously defamed her by publicly calling her case a "hoax," "scam," “lie” and “complete con job” — mentioned his new statement to Judge Lewis A. Kaplan. He wasn't pleased.
“What seems to be the 🦩case is that your client is basically endeavoring, certainly, to speak to his quote-unquote public, but, more troubling, the jury in this case about stuff that has no business being spoken about," the judge told Trump's lawyers. He called Trump's post “a public statement that, on the face of it, seems entirely inappropr💮iate."
Trump attorney Joe Tacopina noted that jurors are told not to follow any news or online commentary about the case. But he said he would as🦹k Trump “to refrain from any further posts about this case.”
“I hope you're more successful,” Kaplan said, adding that Trump “may or may not ﷺbe tampering ꩵwith a new source of potential liability.”
The trial comes as Trump again seeks the Republican nomination for president, and weeks after he pleaded not guilty to unrelated criminal charges that involve payments made to silence a porn actor who said she had a sexual encountꦅer with him.
Carr🀅oll's federal lawsuit seeks unspecified damages and a retraction of his allegedly defamatory comments.
The suit was filed under a New York law that temporarily lets decades-old sexual abuse claims go to civil court. She nev🐎er pursued crimꦬinal charges.
The Associated Press typically does not name people who say they have been sexually assaulted unless they come forward publ꧙icly, as Carroll💟 has done.
