A United States appeals court denied on Thursday Donald Trump’s request to pause his upcoming defamation trial in a lawsuit brought by writer E. Jean Carroll.
Last week, the former president’s attorneys asked the court to delay the case for up to 90 days, asserting that they needed more time to consider whether to approach the U.S. Supreme Court after their presidential immunity claim was shot down.
Trump argued that he couldn’t be sued for remarks he made in 2019 about Carroll and her sexual assault allegations against him because, as president, it was his job to tell the public that the accusations were false.
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But, in a unanimous decision, the three-judge appeals court panel found that Trump waited too long–three years–to come up with the defense.
The Jan. 16 trial, which will determine how much Trump owes Carroll in damages for his defamatory comments, will be Carroll’s second against the former president.
In the previous case, she said Trump raped her at a New York department store in the 1990s and later defamed her after he called her accounts a “con job.”
In May, the jury found that Trump sexually abused and defamed Carroll and awarded the writer $5 million in damages.
Trump has also used the presidential immunity claim in Special Counsel Jack Smith’s criminal election interference case. U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan denied that immunity claim, an order that Trump has since appealed.
Read it at Raw Story
