2023 may as well be the Jurassic era for how long ago it feels now, but cast your minds back to a time when it appeared that Donald Trump‘s many legal problems might sink his candidacy.
In May 2023 and Jan 2024, New York City juries found Trump liable in civil court for sexually abusing E. Jean Carroll in 1996 and also found him guilty of defaming her. Trump was ordered to pay her $5 million for the sexual abuse and $83.3 million for the defamation. He immediately appealed, only for that to be slapped down by the United States Court of Appeals.
The appeal court judges said that Trump and his legal team had not come close to showing that the trial judge “erred in any of the challenged rulings” and could not prove there were any procedural errors: “Further, he has not carried his burden to show that any claimed error or combination of claimed errors affected his substantial rights as required to warrant a new trial.”
Now he’s trying once again to wriggle out of this, confirming that he’s going all the way to the Supreme Court to beg them to reverse the judgments so he doesn’t have to pay a penny. The deadline for this petition should be Sept. 10, but Trump wants that extended to Nov. 10.
Donald Trump is going to ask the Supreme Court to cancel his Civil Court conviction for Raping E. Jean Carroll.
— BladeoftheSun (@BladeoftheS) September 4, 2025
And some people still say he is not a dictator, or a rapist.
His lawyers continue to insist, in the face of overwhelming evidence otherwise, that there were “significant issues” in the judges’ decisions. Carroll’s attorney, Roberta Kaplan, sounds like she’s rolling her eyes when she said she doesn’t “believe that President Trump will be able to present any legal issues in the Carroll cases that merit review by the United States Supreme Court.”
Running out of legal road…
Trump will doubtless be infuriated that the judge dealing with his petition is Obama appointee Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who handles requests from cases in the 2nd Circuit. If she says no, he’ll doubtless squawk and squeal over “activist judges”, though he should be confident as extensions of time are routinely granted.
But, even if he does lose the case and runs out of legal road to appeal, that’s no guarantee he’s going to pay Carroll the money he owes her. If he just doesn’t, what’s the worst that can happen to him? Are repo men going to show up at the White House? There’s nobody in America who can enforce that order, and Trump himself has displayed a willingness to ignore judicial orders.
Carroll may win in court, but maybe don’t pop open the champagne until that money is sitting in your bank account.
