Trump’s Rape Trial Testimony Is Coming Back to Bite Him in Hush-Money Case
The Manhattan D.A. will be able to use Trump’s damning testimony in the E. Jean Carroll case against him.
The Manhattan district attorney is officially allowed to use Donald Trump’s deposition from his sexual assault trial, meaning that the most devastating testimony in the upcoming trial over alleged hush-money payments could come from the former president himself.
Alvin Bragg indicted Trump in April, charging him with 34 counts for business fraud for his role in alleged hush-money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels. Bragg asked Monday if he could use Trump’s deposition from his civil trial with writer E. Jean Carroll, in which Trump was found liable for sexual abuse.
And on Thursday, Judge Lewis Kaplan, who presided over the Carroll trial, granted that request.
In his deposition in the Carroll case, Trump defends the infamous Access Hollywood tape, a 2005 recording of the show in which he brags about being able to “grab” women “by the pussy” whenever he wants because he is famous. When asked about it during deposition for the Carroll case, Trump said, “Well, historically, that’s true with stars. Well, if you look over the last million years, I guess that’s been largely true. Not always, but largely true. Unfortunately, or fortunately.”
Bragg argued that the Access Hollywood tape shows “the way in which [Trump] dealt with allegations of a sexual nature by women in the months leading up to the 2016 presidential election.” Bragg could use the testimony to prove that Trump could and would do anything to avoid prosecution for his behavior.
Trump was unanimously found liable in May for sexual abuse and battery against Carroll in the mid-1990s and for defaming her in 2022 while denying the assault. Trump did not testify during the trial, but his depositions proved her case all the same. Carroll also has another defamation lawsuit pending against Trump.