On Tuesday, attorneys for former president Donald Trump argued in the highest municipal court in the District of Columbia that his potentially defamatory statements about New York novelist E. Jean Carroll, who says he r*ped her in the 1990s, were made in the course of his official responsibilities.
In June 2019, Trump refuted Carroll’s accusation, accusing her of faking the rape to help sell a book and insulting her attractiveness by adding, “Number one, she’s not my type.” Trump insists he was working on behalf of the American people at the time.
To what extent Trump was within his rights to defend his employer, the United States government, in a hearing before a full panel of justices in Washington will be determined. Carroll, who was present during the session, claims that the president’s remarks were motivated only by vanity.
This battle might affect Trump’s chances of winning the presidency in 2024. If Trump wins, the underlying defamation claim Carroll filed against him will be dismissed before it goes to trial in April in Manhattan. Trump has always disputed allegations that he r*ped Carroll and said that she compelled him to speak out by making the rape claim public.
According to Trump’s attorney Alina Habba, who spoke during the court, “there exists a great public interest in having a president with a maximum ability to deal fearlessly with the American people” when he is accused of misconduct. She elaborated afterward, saying, “This was thrust upon him and he was responding to the press in his job,” she added later.
In a prior case, a federal appeals court in Manhattan found that Trump was a “covered employee” under the legislation shielding such individuals from lawsuits arising out of their official activities. The district court in New York then referred the question of whether Trump’s remarks regarding Carroll constituted an employment responsibility to the DC Court of Appeals.
An attorney representing Carroll Joshua Matz said Trump has a “historical history” of “engaging in these sorts of extremely personal accusations” against women who accuse him of misbehavior, which undermines the premise that the statements were designed to defend the US government.
“Where you see somebody before during and after the presidency engaging in very similar conduct — even if, as Ms. Habba suggests, he’s doing it now for the greater good of the American people — that tends to suggest that the motivation isn’t really anything relating to their job,” Matz said. “It’s just how they roll — it’s their m.o.”
The https://smartnewszone.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/21-1.jpgistration has taken Trump’s side in the lawsuit, defending his right to respond publicly to claims, but not the tone of his statements about Carroll. Carroll sued Trump for violence in a second action in November, and she also claimed defamation over a comment he made about her in 2017.
A court in New York has determined that portions of Trump’s deposition in the case may be made public in the coming days. Trump has disputed the allegation that he assaulted Carroll in a Manhattan dressing room over twenty years ago with great vehemence.
Last Lines
On Tuesday, counsel for former president Donald Trump argued in the highest municipal court in the District of Columbia that his possibly defamatory words regarding New York author E. Jean Carroll were made in the course of his official obligations and so should be discounted.
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