After being found liable for sexual abuse and defamation, President Trump is seeking a court order that would substantially curtail the amount of money he has been ordered to pay author E. Jean Carroll, who accused the former president of attacking her at a high end department store in the 1990s. 

Following the jury’s decision, Mr. Trump was ordered to pay Ms. Carroll a total of $5 million — $2 million for sexual abuse and $3 million for defamation. Ms. Carroll claimed during the civil trial that she had been raped, but she failed to convince the jury. 

Mr. Trump’s legal team argues that because Ms. Carroll failed to prove it was more likely than not that she had been raped, the court must rework the damages Mr. Trump has been ordered to pay. “The Court should order a new trial on damages … because contrary to Plaintiff’s claim of rape, the Jury found that she was not raped but was sexually abused by Defendant during the 1995/1996 Bergdorf Goodman incident.”

“Such abuse could have included groping of Plaintiff’s breasts through clothing, or similar conduct, which is a far cry from rape,” Mr. Trump’s lawyers wrote. “Therefore, an award of $2 million for such conduct, which admittedly did not cause any diagnosed mental injury to Plaintiff, is grossly excessive under the applicable case law.”

In total, the former president’s legal team argues that he should not have to pay more than $868,000 in damages. 

Ms. Carroll has filed a second defamation claim against Mr. Trump following his appearance at a CNN town hall in New Hampshire, which came after she won her lawsuit. During the hour-long broadcast, the former president said Ms. Carroll’s lawsuit and the subsequent jury ruling was “fake” and a “made-up story.” He also called Ms. Carroll a “wack job” during the town hall. 

The Monday following the televised event, Ms. Carroll’s legal team filed a lawsuit in Manhattan seeking additional damages for defamation. Mr. Trump’s comments showed “the depth of his malice toward Carroll, since it is hard to imagine defamatory conduct that could possibly be more motivated by hatred, ill will or spite.”

During the civil case against Mr. Trump, Ms. Carroll’s lawyers argued that the attack was part of a decades-long pattern of Mr. Trump assaulting women, defaming them when he is publicly accused, and disparaging their physical appearances and motivations. 

One of Ms. Carroll’s attorneys, Shawn Crowley, argued that Mr. Trump’s treatment toward women is well-documented. “Start with a friendly encounter in a semi-public place,” Ms. Crowley said to the jury. “All of a sudden: Pounce, kiss, grab, grope. Don’t wait. And when they speak up about what happened, attack. Humiliate them. Call them liars. Call them too ugly to assault.”

Multiple women came forward to support Ms. Carroll and to detail their own alleged encounters with Mr. Trump. One woman, Jessica Leeds, claimed the former president groped her on a plane in the late 1970s after she was invited to sit in first class. 

“He was trying to kiss me and trying to pull me,” Ms. Leeds told the jury. “He was grabbing my breasts. It’s like he had 40 zillion hands.”

Another woman, Natasha Stoyonoff, testified that Mr. Trump sexually assaulted her at his Mar-a-Lago estate in late 2005 when she was writing a profile of Mr. Trump and his wife, Melania, for People magazine. 

Ms. Stoyonoff claimed that while Mr. Trump was giving her a private tour of Mar-a-Lago, he took her to an empty room and shut the door behind her. “He was against me and just holding my shoulders back,” Ms. Stoyonoff said. “I didn’t say words. I couldn’t. I tried. I mean, I was just flustered and sort of shocked and I — no words came out of me. I tried, though. I remember just sort of mumbling.”