Writer told jury at trial: Donald Trump raped me

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NEW YORK >> At first, she thought helping Donald Trump shop for a women’s lingerie gift at a luxury department store would be a “funny New York thing.”

Although, according to E. Jean Carroll, the then-businessman beckoned him into a dressing room as they dared each other to try on a see-through bodysuit, he came up with something like a “Saturday Night Live” he wrote.

But soon, “my whole reason for being alive at that moment was to get out of that room,” Carroll testified Wednesday at his rape trial.

“I’m here because Donald Trump raped me, and when I wrote this, he said it didn’t happen. He lied and ruined my reputation, and I’m here to try to get my life back,” Carroll told jurors.

As he took the stand to give testimony that at times brought him to tears, Trump, from afar, repeated his insistence that Carroll’s claim of a 1996 rape was a complete fabrication. He called the case “a manufactured scam,” and more.

“This is a deceptive and false story — Witch Hunt!” Trump wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social. His comments prompted the judge to warn Trump’s lawyers that he could bring more legal trouble on himself.

Trump has not attended the trial so far, but his lawyers said Tuesday that he may still decide to testify.

The trial comes as Trump again seeks the Republican nomination for president, and weeks after he pleaded not guilty to unrelated criminal charges related to payments made to silence a porn actor who said he had he had sex with her.

Carroll, a 79-year-old former advice columnist, is more concerned with the stand-of-fact — so much so that after he broke down in tears as he told jurors that “getting my day in court is everything to mine,” he quickly composed himself and refused to rest.

“I’m not going to sit here and cry and waste everybody’s time,” he said.

Carroll testified that he crossed paths with Trump at the revolving door to Bergdorf Goodman on an unspecified Thursday night in the spring of 1996. At the time, he was writing a long-running advice column for Elle magazine, which also wrote for “SNL.” Trump is a real estate magnate and social figure in New York.

He said he asked her for advice on choosing a gift for a girl, and he was happy to oblige. As an advice columnist, Trump asking for a gift guide “was a nice prospect,” and Carroll thought he’d end up with a funny story, he said.

She testified that he suggested a hat, but she turned to underwear, and soon they were joking about the bodysuit. Delighted and flirtatious, she goes along, laughing even as he closes the door to the dressing room, maybe even pushes her against a wall.

But then, she said, Trump covered her mouth with her, pulled down her pantyhose and pushed his hand and then his penis inside her as she struggled against him. He said he finally made her kneel down and ran away.

Carroll said that for decades, she told no one but two friends because she feared Trump would retaliate, because she “thought it was my fault” and because she thought many people blamed rape victims for what happened to them.

The alleged assault occurred long before the #MeToo movement forced a reckoning with how law enforcement and the public treated victims of sexual assault. Carroll said #MeToo strengthened her decision to move forward with a 2019 memoir and accompanying magazine excerpt.

The Associated Press typically does not name people who say they were sexually assaulted unless they go public, as Carroll did.

Trump, 76, said he was not in the store with Carroll and had no idea who she was when he first went public with the story. He said he was “absolutely lying” and called the case a “fraud,” a “lie” and a “complete con job.”

Trump’s comments launched a “shocking” onslaught of hateful and occasionally threatening messages toward him, according to Carroll, which included a defamation claim.

As court was about to begin Wednesday, Trump used Truth Social to air his feelings about the case again and cited a DNA issue that Judge Lewis A. Kaplan ruled could not be part of the case.

He was not happy.

Trump, the judge said, appeared to be addressing his supporters and the jury “about things that no one is talking about.” Kaplan called Trump’s post “a public statement that, on its face, seems completely inappropriate.”

Trump attorney Joe Tacopina said jurors were told not to follow any news or online commentary about the trial. But he said he would ask Trump to “avoid any further posts about this case.”

“I hope you’re more successful,” Kaplan said, adding that Trump “may or may not be stepping into a new source of potential liability.”

Carroll is due to continue testifying on Thursday, when Trump’s lawyers will likely have a chance to question him. His federal lawsuit seeks unspecified damages and a retraction of his allegedly defamatory comments. He never pursued criminal charges.

Meanwhile, the judge ruled Wednesday that the trial will not test the funding Carroll’s lawyers obtained from American Future Republic, an organization funded by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman.

Trump’s lawyers argued that the money raised questions about Carroll’s credibility. Kaplan concluded that “it’s not there” and, after hearing that Trump’s son Eric had just tweeted criticism of the funding, he again advised Tacopina to talk to Donald Trump.

Tacopina claims Carroll sued to get money and try to punish Trump politically. Carroll, a registered Democrat, testified that he voted for his Democratic opponents in 2016 and 2020 but said that had nothing to do with his lawsuit.

“I’m not settling a political score,” he said. “I’m settling a personal score.”

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