Judge denies Trump’s request in defamation lawsuit

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

• US District Judge Lewis Kaplan on Tuesday ruled against President Donald Trump’s request that the US would replace him as the defendant in a defamation lawsuit filed against him over three decades ago.
• Kaplan said that the president cannot cite the law that protects federal employees from getting sued during their government tenure.
• The accuser, former Elle magazine columnist E. Jean Caroll, claimed that Trump raped her when they had an accidental meet up at the Bergdorf Goodman store.

On Tuesday, President Donald Trump’s court’s request — for the defendant’s name to be changed from Trump to the United States in a defamation lawsuit filed at him in 1990s for an alleged rape — was denied by a federal judge.

US District Judge Lewis Kaplan gave the verdict following US Justice Department’s argument that Trump should be replaced as the accused in an indictment filed by columnist E. Jean Carroll.

According to government lawyers, the US could substitute for Trump as the defendant since the president was coerced to acknowledge the lawsuit to show he was well-fit for the presidency.

Roberta Kaplan, Carroll’s attorney, described the decision as a victory.

“The simple truth is that President Trump defamed our client because she was brave enough to reveal that he had sexually assaulted her, and that brutal, personal attack cannot be attributed to the Office of the President,” Kaplan said in a statement.

Trump’s lawyers and the Justice Department has not yet provided a comment.

Judge Kaplan said that the law that protects federal employees from getting sued during their government tenure does not apply to a president. 

“The President of the United States is not an employee of the Government within the meaning of the relevant statutes,” he wrote. 

“Even if he were such an employee, President Trump’s allegedly defamatory statements concerning Ms. Carroll would not have been within the scope of his employment. Accordingly, the motion to substitute the United States in place of President Trump is denied.”

In a written argument, Carroll’s attorney said that “only in a world gone mad could it somehow be presidential, not personal, for Trump to slander a woman who he sexually assaulted.”

Last week, the Justice Department’s lawyer was prohibited from entering the Manhattan federal courthouse since he did not self-isolate for two weeks. He came from a state where new cases of COVID-19 infections were on a surge. The department was left with no choice but to stick to written arguments for the time being.

A former advice columnist for Elle magazine, Carroll claimed in her lawsuit that she and Trump had a chance encounter in the fall of 1995 or spring of 1996 at the Bergdorf Goodman store. They had a small talk about trying a see-through bodysuit on, and when they reached the dressing room, Trump raped her, forcing her against the wall.

Trump debunked Carroll’s accusation, saying she was “totally lying” and had never met her. A 1987 photo, however, revealed that both of them were together with their previous-spouses at an event.

Source: AOL.com