Carroll v. Trump

Case Overview

E. Jean Carroll sued Donald Trump for defamation over statements he made in June 2019, while president, denying her account that he sexually assaulted her in a Manhattan department store dressing room in the mid-1990s and attacking her credibility. Before Judge Lewis A. Kaplan in the Southern District of New York, a January 2024 jury found Trump liable and awarded $83.3 million, $18.3 million in compensatory damages and $65 million in punitive damages. The Second Circuit affirmed on September 8, 2025 (No. 24-644), holding among other things that Trump had not properly preserved a presidential-immunity defense. The Supreme Court denied Trump's first certiorari petition on June 29, 2026. Two petitions are now before the Court: Trump's own petition asking whether his 2019 White House statements are official acts protected by presidential immunity under Trump v. United States and whether that immunity was waived, and a separate petition by the United States arguing it should have been substituted as the defendant under the Westfall Act after the Attorney General recertified that Trump acted within the scope of his office.