An explosive appeal from Trump over E. Jean Carroll sexual abuse verdict stalls at the Supreme Court

By John Fritze, Kara Scannell, CNN

(CNN) — As the justices of the Supreme Court prepared to meet behind closed doors on February 27, they had before them an explosive case involving President Donald Trump, who is seeking to overturn a federal jury’s finding that he sexually abused and defamed magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll.

But a day before the justices held that private meeting, the Trump case was yanked without explanation.

Since then, the politically sensitive appeal, which Trump initially filed in November, has been set on the court’s agenda and rescheduled 15 times. Only one other has been rescheduled as often in the current term, according to a CNN analysis.

Since Trump filed his appeal seven months ago, the president lost a separate $83 million case involving Carroll, and the Justice Department launched a criminal investigation into the magazine columnist.

The nation’s highest court almost never explains its handling of pending appeals and has not done so in the Carroll case. The delay could be because one or more justices is writing an opinion about the case. Or the court could be waiting for other appeals involving the Trump and Carroll dispute that are expected soon.

Whatever the reason, the delay has benefited Trump — in part because it has deferred a $5 million verdict a jury in New York awarded to Carroll more than three years ago.

“The oddity here isn’t just that the court has rescheduled one of the Carroll cases 15 times, it’s the absence of a persuasive justification for it having done so,” said Steve Vladeck of the Georgetown School of Law and a CNN Supreme Court analyst.

The most logical explanation, Vladeck said, is that the court is waiting for the other expected appeals, even though the cases deal with different legal issues.

“The only other explanation is some kind of special solicitude for President Trump — which runs into the problem that this case, at least, is about conduct he engaged in when he was not in office,” Vladeck said.

Carroll sued Trump in 2019 for defamation and then she sued him again in 2022 for defamation and battery after the state enacted a law allowing the victims of sexual abuse to file civil claims for past incidents. In an unusual quirk, the second case — the one filed in 2022 — went to trial first and the jury awarded Carroll $5 million. That is the case that is already pending at the Supreme Court.

The 2019 case went to trial second and resulted in an $83 million judgment against Trump. The first case — filed in 2019 — is expected to land at the Supreme Court in the coming days.

Including interest, Trump owes Carroll over $100 million.

Carroll’s 2022 suit alleged that he sexually assaulted her in a New York department store in the mid-1990s and defamed her by claiming she made up the story to boost sales of a book. Trump, who has repeatedly denied wrongdoing, has claimed US District Judge Lewis Kaplan, who oversaw the civil trial, made numerous errors by allowing the jury to hear testimony from two women who alleged Trump sexually assaulted them years ago.

Trump also argued that the judge should not have let the jurors see the “Access Hollywood tape,” which captured Trump in 2005 on a hot mic saying he gropes and kisses women.

“You know I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything, … Grab them by the pussy. You can do anything,” Trump was heard saying on the recording.

Kaplan concluded the recording was relevant for the jury to hear because it added to the probability that Trump “in fact has had contact with women’s genitalia in the past without their consent, or that he has attempted to do so.”

Last year, the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the jury’s $5 million verdict against Trump, ruling the trial judge did not make errors that would warrant a new trial. In June 2025, Trump lost an effort to have the appeal reviewed by the full bench of judges and, months later, he appealed to the Supreme Court.

“It is deeply damaging to the fabric of our republic for President Trump, in the midst of a historic presidency, to have to take his focus away from his singular and unique duties as chief executive to continue fighting against decades-old, false allegations and the myriad wrongs throughout this baseless case,” the president’s attorneys told the Supreme Court in a January filing. “This mistreatment of a President cannot be allowed to stand.”

In urging the high court to deny the case, Carroll’s attorneys argued that the district court acted within its jurisdiction in how it handled the evidence.

In a highly technical brief at the Supreme Court dealing with rules of evidence, Carroll’s attorneys focused largely on the 2nd Circuit decision upholding the verdict.

“The court’s duty was simply to decide whether a jury could reasonably find by a preponderance of the evidence that Mr. Trump committed an act of sexual assault,” a three-judge panel of the 2nd Circuit, all three of whom were appointed by Democratic presidents, ruled unanimously. “If it could so find, the court had the discretion to admit the evidence.”

Those written arguments were all submitted to the Supreme Court by the end of January.

And that’s when the delays began.

During its October-to-June term, the Supreme Court justices meet privately in conferences once a week to discuss whether to grant or deny pending appeals. It takes four justices to grant a case.

But appeals are often held for multiple conferences for many different reasons. Under Chief Justice John Roberts, the court almost always holds an appeal for at least a second meeting before granting the appeal and scheduling oral arguments, for instance. And sometimes, cases are repeatedly relisted and denied without explanation.

Sometimes cases are held to give a justice an opportunity to dissent from a decision to deny it. Sometimes, the justices seem likely to be waiting for a similar case to make its way up through the lower courts. Often, the reason is opaque.

Usually, when a case is held, it is “relisted” for future conferences. The Supreme Court has been relisting multiple appeals involving local bans on assault-style weapons and high-capacity magazines since December, for instance.

But what’s different about the case involving Carroll is that the president’s appeal is being “rescheduled.” That suggests it’s not being discussed at all — at least not formally.

Last year, the court rescheduled a case dealing with the federal government’s sweeping power to prosecute crimes on Native American lands 17 times — holding it over its summer recess. In the end, the petition was denied.

Only one other case has been rescheduled as many times as the Carroll appeal. That case, which involves a housing police officer in Ohio who shot and killed a suspect who was fleeing with a gun in his hand, has also rescheduled 15 times.

A spokesperson for the Supreme Court did not respond to a request for comment.

Carroll’s attorneys declined to comment. Trump’s legal team referred to a prior comment on the case in which he described Carroll’s claims as “false” and “Liberal Lawfare.”

Much has changed in the legal brawl between Trump and Carroll since the case made its way to the Supreme Court’s docket. The Justice Department launched a criminal investigation into Carroll last month that is focused on whether she committed perjury in testimony tied to the pending appeal.

Meanwhile, a second case involving Trump and Carroll appears to be on the way.

Carroll sued Trump again over statements he made about her in 2019. A jury in New York found those statements were defamatory and ordered Trump to pay $83 million in damages. A federal appeals court panel affirmed the damages award finding it “reasonable in light of the extraordinary and egregious facts” and rejected several of Trump’s legal challenges. Among them, the appeals court found that Trump had previously waived any claim of presidential immunity and said the Supreme Court’s decision in 2024 involving presidential immunity did not alter their view.

The full 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals declined to revisit that decision in late April.

In an unusual letter in the Carroll case already pending at the Supreme Court, Trump’s attorneys wrote on June 2 that they intend to appeal the second case to the Supreme Court “within the next month.”

“The court,” Trump’s attorneys added, “may wish to consider the petitions together.”

Given the way scheduling works at the Supreme Court, that round would almost certainly push a decision on whether to hear or deny the Carroll matter into the fall.

On Monday, the court once against added the case to its agenda for Thursday.

The-CNN-Wire
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