(WASHINGTON) — Attorneys for Donald Trump have repeated their request for a delay of the $83 million judgment in E. Jean Carroll’s defamation case against the former president, arguing that the former columnist’s lawyers contradicted themselves in a recent court filing.
Defense lawyers Alina Habba — along with D. John Sauer, who was recently added to the Carroll case after arguing for presidential immunity in Trump’s federal election interference case — renewed Trump’s request that Judge Lewis Kaplan delay the judgment for 30 days after Kaplan resolves the post-trial motions, or that he permits Trump to post a reduced bond of $24.475 million.
“Remitting the $7.3 million award and the $65 million punitive award, as discussed above, would reduce the bond amount to $24.475 million, which would be more than sufficient to secure any minimal risk to Plaintiff,” Trump’s attorneys wrote in a filing over the weekend.
Last month, Kaplan declined Trump’s initial request for a reduced bond or a delay, but asked for a reply from Carroll’s lawyers. In a filing last week, her attorneys argued that the reasoning in Trump’s request relief “boils down to nothing more than ‘trust me."”
Trump’s lawyers responded by arguing that Carroll’s concern about Trump’s limited finances is contradictory, highlighting that at trial her lawyers emphasized Trump’s wealth to convince the jury to reach a higher damages award.
“Plaintiff’s current position — that President Trump’s ability to satisfy a judgment of $83.3 million is in doubt — is ‘clearly inconsistent’ with her position barely one month ago that President Trump has $14 billion in assets and can thus easily satisfy an enormous punitive award,” defense lawyers wrote.
While Trump also owes $454 million in his civil fraud case, his defense lawyers argued that judgment is “unlikely to be upheld on appeal” and that the former president has many illiquid assets that could secure the judgment.
“Having accused President Trump of failing to provide evidence, Plaintiff relies heavily on double-hearsay, speculative news articles alleging facts outside the record to imply that President Trump’s financial situation is precarious — contradicting her own trial evidence,” defense lawyers wrote.
Trump in January was ordered to pay $83.3 million in damages to Carroll, a former Elle magazine columnist, for defaming her in 2019 when he denied her allegation that he sexually abused her in the dressing room of a Manhattan department store in the 1990s.
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