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Trump had previously denied the accusation, saying in a June 2019 interview that he had never met E Jean Carroll and that she was “not my type.”
FILE: US President Donald Trump speaks during the daily briefing on the novel coronavirus, COVID-19, at the White House on March 19, 2020, in Washington, DC. Image: AFP
NEW YORK – The United States Department of Justice called on Tuesday to defend Donald Trump against a lawsuit by a prominent American columnist who says the president violated it, a move that is likely to delay the case.
E Jean Carroll, 76, alleges that Trump sexually assaulted her in the locker room of the posh Bergdorf Goodman department store on New York’s Fifth Avenue in the mid-1990s.
She sued the Republican billionaire in November 2019 in upstate New York, charging him with defamation for saying she was “totally lying” about the assault.
Trump had previously denied the accusation, saying in a June 2019 interview that he had never met Carroll and that she was “not my type.”
The case has been ongoing and the judge recently denied a request from one of Trump’s personal attorneys, Marc Kasowitz, to dismiss the lawsuit.
On Tuesday, the federal Justice Department requested in a document filed in state court to replace Kasowitz, arguing that Trump was “acting within the scope of his position or employment” when he made the allegedly defamatory comments and thus could be defended. . by government attorneys.
The Justice Department also requested that the case be transferred to the federal court in Manhattan.
Carroll’s attorney, Roberta Kaplan, said the department’s “shocking” intervention will likely delay the case, even though Trump, who is seeking reelection in November, “will soon have to present documents, provide a DNA sample and sit down to a deposition “.
“Trump’s effort to exercise the power of the United States government to evade responsibility for his private misconduct is unprecedented, and shows even more starkly how far he is willing to go to prevent the truth from coming out,” he said in a release.
Carroll also criticized the department’s move.
“Trump will do everything possible, including using the full powers of the federal government, to prevent the discovery from moving forward in my case before the next election to try to prevent a jury from deciding which of us is lying,” he said. as it says in the statement.
“But Trump underestimates me, and he has also underestimated the American people.”
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