Donald Trump‘s already-stained reputation as a former United States president has been further tarnished by a new lawsuit related to a past rape allegation, adding to his list of controversies.
Advice columnist and author E. Jean Carroll recently filed the lawsuit and is scheduled to appear in court this week, The Guardian reports. This legal action comes years after Carroll accused Trump of sexually assaulting her in a New York department store. The alleged event occurred nearly thirty years ago, in 1995 when Carroll and Trump were at Bergdorf Goodman. Carroll claimed the businessman used the guise of needing help to find a gift for an unidentified woman to get her alone in a dressing room, where the assault took place. Trump has denied the allegations.
The publication also states that Carroll — who is seeking damages — is suing Trump under a recently passed New York state law that gives adult sexual assault victims with an expired statute of limitations a year “to file civil cases.” Although the jury selection for Carroll’s civil suit is set for April 25, news outlets report that Trump would not be present. According to the Associated Press, the 76-year-old’s attorney, Joe Tacopina, claimed that Trump’s absence is “to avoid logistical burdens” that the state of New York and its court system could face if he attended.
Carroll first revealed details of the alleged sexual assault in 2019 after releasing her book “What Do We Need Men For? A Modest Proposal.” At the time, Carroll explained the reason why she decided to speak up about the event decades later was because her friends’ advice and the rise of the #MeToo movement that has successfully taken down powerful men with heinous pasts.
As the book started to generate traction after its excerpts were published on The Cut, Trump released a statement on his social media platform Truth Social and denied the allegations. The father of five even went as far as to say that he had never met Carroll. To make matters even worse, in a past video testimony for a lawsuit released this year, Trump described Carroll as a “nut job” and “mentally sick” as he falsely claimed she enjoyed being sexually assaulted as she recalled the event in a television interview.
In the transcript, Trump also stated that she is using the publicity she obtained from the rape allegations to promote her book and that he plans to sue her after all this is done.
This is one of many legal troubles Trump is currently facing. The entrepreneur has been hit with over 30 charges related to business fraud after allegedly falsifying documents regarding his massive payout to adult film star Stormy Daniels in an attempt to hide their alleged affair.
At this time, no additional details regarding Carroll’s suit have been released.
