The United States Justice Department is criminally investigating E. Jean Carroll for perjury related to her successful lawsuits against Trump for defamation and sexual abuse. Carroll accused President Donald Trump of raping her in a department store in in the 1990s, and a jury found that he had sexually abused her.
In short, the Department of Justice, which is overseen by Trump, is criminally investigating a woman a jury essentially found Trump raped, not because she supposedly lied about the rape, but because she may have initially lied about whether somebody helped pay a portion of her legal bills, which her attorneys corrected on the legal record before the trial began.
How did we get here?
In 2019, Carroll accused Trump of sexually assaulting her in a New York Magazine article.
The moment the dressing-room door is closed, he lunges at me, pushes me against the wall, hitting my head quite badly, and puts his mouth against my lips. I am so shocked I shove him back and start laughing again. He seizes both my arms and pushes me up against the wall a second time, and, as I become aware of how large he is, he holds me against the wall with his shoulder and jams his hand under my coat dress and pulls down my tights.
I am astonished by what I’m about to write: I keep laughing. The next moment, still wearing correct business attire, shirt, tie, suit jacket, overcoat, he opens the overcoat, unzips his pants, and, forcing his fingers around my private area, thrusts his penis halfway — or completely, I’m not certain — inside me. It turns into a colossal struggle. I am wearing a pair of sturdy black patent-leather four-inch Barneys high heels, which puts my height around six-one, and I try to stomp his foot. I try to push him off with my one free hand — for some reason, I keep holding my purse with the other — and I finally get a knee up high enough to push him out and off and I turn, open the door, and run out of the dressing room.
The whole episode lasts no more than three minutes. I do not believe he ejaculates. I don’t remember if any person or attendant is now in the lingerie department. I don’t remember if I run for the elevator or if I take the slow ride down on the escalator. As soon as I land on the main floor, I run through the store and out the door — I don’t recall which door — and find myself outside on Fifth Avenue.
Trump denied it, denied knowing Carroll, and insulted her. Carroll sued him for defamation. In 2022, Carroll sued Trump once more for defamation and for battery. In 2023, by a preponderance of the evidence, a jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll and for defaming her. In other words, a jury of regular people evaluated the evidence and decided it was more likely than not Trump sexually abused Carroll. The jury did not find Trump liable for the more strictly defined offense of rape, which was strictly defined in New York law only as vaginal penetration by a penis.
The judge in the case clarified that the jury essentially found "that Mr. Trump did 'rape' Ms. Carroll as that term is commonly used and understood in contexts outside of the New York Penal Law."
Trump also lost the 2019 defamation suit. Between the two suits, Trump was ordered to pay Carroll almost $90 million in damages. Thus far, Trump's various appeals of the orders have been unsuccessful; however, he is asking the Supreme Court to permit a legal maneuver that would essentially get the get the verdicts and cases thrown out.
In a Tuesday filing, Assistant U.S. Attorney General Brett Shumate said the government would seek to use the Westfall Act to swap Trump for the U.S. as the defendant in the lawsuit. That would require dismissal of the case because the federal government can’t be sued for defamation. A panel of appeals court judges previously denied the U.S.’s effort to insert itself as the defendant.
The Rapist Investigates the Rape Victim
Now, the US Department of Justice, which Trump ultimately oversees, is criminally investigating Carroll for perjury, not about what Trump did to her, but about whether somebody helped pay for a portion of her legal bills.
Prosecutors’ theory hinges on a 2022 deposition statement by Carroll, 82, that she received no outside funding for her lawsuit, though it was later revealed that billionaire Reid Hoffman had paid some legal fees and expenses.
This information is not new. In fact, Carroll's attorneys revealed the information to the judge before the trial began.
In a 2022 videotaped deposition, Carroll told then-Trump attorney Alina Habba that no one else was paying for her legal fees. But two weeks before the trial Carroll’s attorneys informed the judge and Trump’s lawyers that they secured funding from Hoffman’s nonprofit.
Ultimately, "[t]he judge permitted Trump’s attorneys to question Carroll again in a deposition, which has not been made public. During the trial, the judge found no issue with Carroll's credibility and prohibited Trump's attorneys from asking about the legal funding issue.
Again, the United States government is criminally investigating a rape victim because she may have lied outside of court several years ago about whether somebody helped pay a portion of her legal bills, which her own attorneys corrected on the legal record before the trial began. The United States government is ultimately led by the man who a jury decided sexually abused the victim and who a judge clarified raped the victim in the every day meaning of the word.
Naked Vengeance and the Chilling Effect
This is yet another, more horrifying, example of the politicization of justice by Donald Trump. The Justice Department, either at Trump's direction or in an effort to please him, is throwing the weight of the US government and its vast resources into tormenting a rape victim because she had the temerity to hold him legally accountable for his actions (something that Trump rarely experiences and that has become even harder to do in light of a Supreme Court decision). It is nothing more than revenge by a rapist against his victim for holding him accountable for his actions.
Even if the government ultimately does not bring charges against Carroll, the stress and financial expenditures that come from dealing with such an investigation are immense and will surely serve as yet another (albeit even more despicable) warning to anyone else who has been harmed by Trump or wishes to hold him legally accountable for his private or public transgressions. If you cause this man trouble, even if warranted, a pretext will be found to bring to bear on you the resources of the US government and the people of the United States. This is a prime example of the "lawfare" of which Trump and his supporters like to claim they are victims.
You will feel pain if you try to hold Donald Trump accountable. And even if you ultimately prevail, do not expect to be compensated for being a victim of the "weaponization" of the legal system.