Supreme Court rejects Trump’s appeal, upholds $5 Million verdict in E. Jean Carroll sexual abuse case

The United States Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear President Donald Trump's appeal of a $5 million jury verdict in a civil case brought by writer E. Jean Carroll, leaving the lower court's ruling in place and dealing a significant legal setback to the president .

The United States Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear President Donald Trump’s appeal of a $5 million jury verdict in a civil case brought by writer E. Jean Carroll, leaving the lower court’s ruling in place and dealing a significant legal setback to the president .

The justices denied the petition for a writ of certiorari without comment, as is customary, meaning the appellate court’s decision is considered final . While the denial does not endorse the lower court’s ruling, it indicates that the criteria for bringing the case to the Supreme Court’s attention have not been met . The decision preserves the outcome of the 2023 trial, in which a federal jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing and defaming Carroll following an encounter in a Manhattan department store in the mid-1990s .

Trump reacted sharply to the decision on his social media platform Truth Social, calling the case a “Fake Case” and vowing to continue fighting what he described as “weaponisation and lawfare” against him . “I will continue the fight against this Weaponization and Lawfare Case against me, including the ridiculous claim of Defamation, with all of my power and strength,” Trump wrote . He maintained he had never met Carroll and argued the legal challenge was an assault on the nation’s foundations, alleging that New York State created a law specifically targeting him and that such an “injustice” should never be permitted against any future president or candidate .

The $5 million award stemmed from a civil proceeding in which jurors found that Trump had sexually abused Carroll and defamed her when he called her claim a “hoax” and a “con job” in a 2022 social media post . They did not find Trump raped Carroll, as she had claimed . The Manhattan-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the verdict in 2024, ruling that evidence, including Trump’s comments on an “Access Hollywood” tape, established a “repeated, idiosyncratic pattern of conduct” consistent with Carroll’s allegations . Carroll also filed a separate lawsuit against Trump, and a jury ordered Trump to pay her $83.3 million for making defamatory statements about her in 2019 . Carroll’s attorney, Roberta Kaplan, said in a statement that the Supreme Court’s decision “affirms once and for all the jury’s unanimous verdict that President Donald J Trump sexually assaulted and defamed E Jean Carroll” .