The Supreme Court has, for the second time this year, looked at Donald Trump's request to erase a jury's $5 million finding that he sexually abused E. Jean Carroll and said, in the formal legal language of a silent shrug, no. The justices offered no explanation, because they didn't have to, and also because sometimes silence is its own verdict.
What the Court Actually Did
According to Axios, the Supreme Court declined to take up Trump's latest attempt to overturn the jury finding that he sexually abused Carroll and owes her $5 million. This is not the first time the court has done this. They already rejected a similar challenge earlier this year. The justices did not explain their reasoning, which is standard practice for cert denials and also, in this case, deeply funny.
This is the part where Trump's legal team was presumably hoping a court that includes three justices he personally appointed would ride in and fix things. Instead, the court collectively looked at the case and decided it had better things to do. Which, in Supreme Court terms, means they had literally anything else to do.
The $83 Million Problem Is Still Very Much a Problem
The $5 million verdict is only part of the financial reckoning sitting in Trump's inbox. Axios reports that his lawyers are still fighting a separate $83.3 million defamation judgment Carroll won against him, with his legal team arguing he is entitled to presidential immunity for statements he made while in office denying her account.
Let that sink in for a second. The argument is that a sitting president should be immune from accountability for lying about a woman he was found by a jury to have sexually abused. That is a legal theory being advanced by actual lawyers with actual bar licenses, in actual American courts.
The defamation case stems from Trump's repeated public denials of Carroll's claims, including statements made during his first presidency. Carroll sued him for those denials, a jury agreed she was defamed, and now her total potential payout from Trump sits north of $88 million combined, pending appeals that seem to be going nowhere fast.
Carroll Has Been Waiting a Long Time for This Money
It is worth understanding just how long this legal saga has dragged on. Carroll first went public with her account of being sexually assaulted by Trump in a New York department store dressing room in the 1990s back in 2019. Trump immediately called her a liar, denied knowing her despite existing photographic evidence to the contrary, and suggested she was too unattractive for him to assault. He then proceeded to keep saying variations of this for years.
The original jury found him liable for sexual abuse and defamation in May 2023. He has spent every moment since trying to claw that verdict back through the courts. Axios notes the payment has been long delayed as the president fought the verdict. Two Supreme Court rejections in a single year suggests the delays are running out of road.
The Immunity Gambit Is Still in Play
Just because the $5 million verdict survived this challenge does not mean Trump's legal team is done. The presidential immunity argument attached to the defamation judgment is a live question, one with teeth given last year's Supreme Court ruling that gave presidents broad immunity for official acts.
Trump's lawyers will argue that denying sexual assault allegations is somehow an official presidential function. That argument has not worked so far, but it has not been fully resolved either. The defamation case and its nine-figure judgment is still working its way through the system, and given how the immunity doctrine has expanded in recent years, nobody should assume it's settled.
The Dingo Take
A jury found this man sexually abused someone. Then the same man became president again. Then his handpicked Supreme Court, twice, refused to help him escape the consequences. At what point does the sheer institutional weight of every single court looking at this case and walking away tell us something?
The immunity play on the defamation judgment is the one to watch. If Trump's lawyers can convince a court that a president lying about his own sexual misconduct counts as an official act deserving protection, then the $83.3 million disappears and Carroll gets nothing for the years of public humiliation Trump put her through after she came forward. That would be a legal outcome so grotesque it would require a new word.
For now, the $5 million verdict stands. Carroll is owed real money by the sitting president of the United States for sexual abuse a jury found he committed. He does not want to pay it. He has now lost that fight at the highest court in the land twice. The story ends one of two ways: he pays, or American courts prove they cannot actually make powerful men do anything. Place your bets.
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