Trump news today: E Jean Carroll snaps back at Trump lawyer Joe Tacopina in tense cross-examination

Ms Carroll, a writer and former advice columnist for Elle magazine, is the plaintiff in a pair of civil lawsuits against former president Donald Trump.

The jurors in the trial will remain anonymous on Judge Kaplan’s orders due to the risk of threats, intimidation or outright violence against anyone seen as an enemy by Mr Trump and his supporters as they hear evidence of allegations made by Ms Carroll against the twice-impeached and indicted ex-president.

Ms Carroll has claimed that Mr Trump raped her in a dressing room at the Bergdorf Goodman department store in Manhattan in the mid-1990s.

Donald Trump’s lawyers entered court for yet another legal showdown in New York this week as the former president faces an accusation of rape from author E Jean Carroll.

It’s part of a long-brewing fight that has vexed the president for nearly a half decade, almost as long as the Stormy Daniels controversy which earlier this month resulted in Mr Trump being hit with 34 criminal counts by Manhattan prosecutors.

Ms Carroll alleges that the former president, then a business mogul known around New York, raped her in the fitting room of a department store in 1995 or 1996. According to news reports, she plans to corroborate her story with the testimony of individuals who will say that Ms Carroll told them shortly after the alleged attack, as well as testimony from other women who will reportedly testify about unwanted sexual advances from Mr Trump.

Ms Carroll said she stopped filming a documentary because “this case became more important”.

“Donald Trump tweeted that the best example of injustice was my suing him,” she said, according to Inner City Press.

Her counsel brought up a Truth Social post by Mr Trump in which called her case a con job and the judicial system a disgrace in addition to comments about Ms Carroll not being his type.

“How did it impact your reputation?” her counsel asked.

“I thought I was back on my feet, had garnered some readers, then boom, he knocks me back down again,” she said.

“I was stunned,” she added.

Donald Trump tore into his rape accuser, E Jean Carroll, on Truth Social in a post that accused her of being bankrolled by a liberal megadonor.

It was a scorching attack that nonetheless had his own attorneys in the most trouble later in the day.

The president wrote in a pair of posts on Wednesday morning that the author and advice columnist was running a “made up scam” and had been “caught lying” about the funding for her legal effort, which is likely in the thousands of dollars (if not much higher) even as the trial is just beginning.

“They got caught lying! The Miss Bergdorf Goodman case is financed by a big political donor that they tried to hide,” he wrote in one post.

In another, he added: “The E. Jean Carroll case, Ms. Bergdorf Goodman, is a made up SCAM. Her lawyer is a political operative, financed by a big political donor that they said didn’t exist, only to get caught lying about that.”

Mr Tacopina brought up that Ms Carroll said she didn’t share her story publically before the 2016 election because her mom was dying.

“She was on her deathbed and my sisters and brothers joined her,” she said.

Mr Tacopina noted that Ms Carroll’s mom passed away in October 2016, according to Law & Crime.

The attorney asked why she didn’t publicise her story shortly afterwards.

“I was in deep, incredibly painful mourning,” Ms Carroll replied. Her mom died at the age of 97.

Mr Tacopina suggested that she didn’t go ahead with the story because she wasn’t ready to publish her book.

“I hadn’t conceived of writing a book at that point,” Ms Carroll said.

There was the public persona; the successful writer, television host and Ask E Jean advice columnist who was always upbeat, optimistic and trying to help others.

“And then I have a private self, and that’s the one that can’t admit out loud that there has been any suffering,” she testified.

The alleged incident caused her to suffer waves of crippling anxiety attacks, left her incapable of forming romantic relationships, and fearful of the flirtatious behaviour she and Mr Trump engaged in prior to the alleged assault, she said.

As he began cross-examining Ms Carroll on 27 April, Mr Tacopina brought up a draft of her book What Do We Need Men For? in which she writes about the episode involving the former president.

“You wrote that you thought Donald Trump was trying to kill you, to poison your water,” he said.

“That’s a draft. That was not published,” Ms Carroll responded.

“I never warmed to him,” wrote the one-time president, “never felt good about anybody having anything to do with John McCain and never will, even despite the fact that at their request, I gave him the world’s longest funeral, 11 days. Much like his wars, it never ended.”

McCain’s funeral took place over five days across three different cities. There is no evidence to show it was “the world’s longest”.

The former naval officer who unsuccessfully ran for president died in 2018 at the age of 81 after a battle with brain cancer.

E Jean Carroll raised her voice in exasperation in a New York courtroom on Thursday as she was repeatedly asked why she didn’t scream while allegedly being raped by Donald Trump – before the judge admonished the ex-president’s lawyer for his line of questioning.

During hours of tense cross-examination, Mr Trump’s attorney Joe Tacopina peppered the 79-year-old former Elle advice columnist with questions about an alleged sexual assault in the dressing room of Manhattan department store Bergdorf Goodman in 1996.

Ms Carroll told how she was filled with adrenaline as she pushed and kicked back against the much larger man during the alleged three-minute encounter.

“I was in too much of a panic to scream, I was fighting,” she said.

Ms Carroll said she’s “also suing him for assault, under the Adult Survivors Act passed by the NYS legislature. I had one year to sue”.

“Did you advocate for that law?” her counsel asked.

“Yes. Because I understand why women, and some men, do not come forward for years,” Ms Carroll said, according to Inner City Press.

After a post by Mr Trump on 12 October 2022, Ms Carroll said she was hit by “a wave of slime, people repeating what Donald Trump said, working for the Democrats, way too ugly. It’s hard to wake up to that, people telling you you’re too ugly to go on living, practically”.