When the $83.3 million verdict in the defamation trial against Donald Trump came in late Friday afternoon, the immediate reaction on Fox News was that the amount was “staggering,” “enormous,” and “unprecedented.”
The New York jury’s decision to make Trump pay $65 million in punitive damages to writer E. Jean Carroll, who a separate jury had already found was sexually assaulted by Trump, was noteworthy, with Fox host Neil Cavuto commenting: “This thing has exploded on him.”
Cavuto then turned to lawyer and Fox contributor Andy McCarthy, who commented on the consequences of Trump’s incessant defamatory statements during the trial.
ADVERTISEMENT
“That’s the risk you run, Neil, when you continue even after there’s been a jury verdict for you on the precise thing. If you’re going to keep saying the same thing again and again and it’s actionable, you’re playing with fire,” McCarthy said, adding that, considering Trump’s boasts about his wealth, “the only way [the jury] can hit him is financially, and it looks like they really did.”
After adding up the damages, Cavuto said the sum was “staggering,” and McCarthy agreed.
“The more times that you engage in this behavior when you’ve gotten the warning that this is actionable stuff and it can run up your bill, you really, truly are playing with fire,” he said.
During the trial, which Trump stormed out of earlier Friday, Carroll’s lawyers pointed to social media posts Trump had made about Carroll as additional evidence of defamation. After the verdict, Trump did more of the same on Telegram, calling the lawsuit a “False Accusation Case.”
Cavuto later turned to John Yoo, a controversial former Justice Department lawyer during the Bush administration, who questioned Trump’s lawyers’ ability to get him to “stop attacking” private citizens.
“The whole point of this—the enormous damages, unprecedented damages now—is to tell Donald Trump to shut up! If you can think of it this way: every time Donald Trump wants to insult E. Jean Carroll, he’s going to have to write a $40 million check for each sentence. That’s how bad this is,” Yoo said with a laugh.
“I can’t believe his lawyers haven’t succeeded in just telling him, look: campaign for president. Run for president. Make your accusations about a two-tiered justice system, but leave this alone. Stop attacking people who are no longer public citizens. Stop attacking people. You’ve already lost and the court has already said what you’ve done is liable. Because every time he insults her again, he’s going to have to cut a $30 million check.”
Yoo added that Trump should stop disrespecting not only Carroll, but “the justice system.”
The historic defamation verdict against the former president was the focus of discussion for the rest of Cavuto’s show. Yet in the next hour, the co-hosts of The Five, Fox’s most-watched show, made no mention of it whatsoever. Instead, the group tried the new Double Big Mac from McDonald’s.
