NEW YORK—A federal judge in New York tossed out Tuesday a lawsuit by Donald Trump in which he claimed he had been defamed by a former magazine columnist after she won a sex abuse case against him.
The former president was found liable in May for sexually abusing E. Jean Carroll in a New York department store in the 1990s — but not for raping her.
Trump sought to turn the tables on the 79-year-old former Elle magazine columnist by filing his own suit in June arguing she had defamed him by continuing to tell US media that he raped her, despite the civil trial verdict.
But in his dismissal ruling on Monday (Tuesday in Manila), District Judge Lewis Kaplan said Carroll’s statements that Trump raped her are “substantially true.”
Trump was ordered to pay Carroll $5 million after the civil trial.
He denies the allegations and has appealed the judgment.
Carroll has sought new damages after Trump called her a “whack job” on CNN the day after the civil trial verdict.
Meanwhile, Trump pushed back against a bid by government lawyers to restrict what he can share publicly about his historic prosecution for allegedly conspiring to overturn the results of the 2020 election.
“I shouldn’t have a protective order placed on me because it would impinge upon my right to FREE SPEECH,” the former president said in a post on his Truth Social platform.
“Deranged Jack Smith and the Department of Injustice should, however, because they are illegally ‘leaking’ all over the place!” he added in a reference to the special counsel who filed the case against him.
In a court filing, lawyers for the former president also argued on Monday that the restrictions proposed by Smith would violate Trump’s right to free speech under the First Amendment to the Constitution.
“In a trial about First Amendment rights, the government seeks to restrict First Amendment rights,” Trump’s attorney John Lauro said, putting forward a line of argument that defense lawyers are expected to make at trial.
