Donald Trump raged after losing his protection by the Department of Justice in the ongoing defamation case brought by writer E. Jean Carroll.
The department notified lawyers for Trump and Carroll that it no longer believed the former president had acted within the scope of his office when he denied raping the author and advice columnist in the mid-1990s, and a jury found him liable for sexual abuse and awarded her $5 million.
"The DOJ will not defend me in the E. Jean Carroll civil case, which is all part of the political Witch Hunt, lawyered up by a political operative who I just beat in another case, financed by a big political funder, and 'judged' by a Clinton appointee who truly hates 'TRUMP,''" the ex-president posted on his Truth Social website. "The statements that I made about Carroll are all true. I didn’t Rape her (I won that at trial) and other than for this case, I have NO IDEA WHO SHE IS, WHAT SHE LOOKS LIKE, OR ANYTHING ABOUT HER."
The Justice Department determined under attorney general William Barr that Trump was acting within the scope of his official duties when he responded to questions in 2019 about Carroll's allegations, which meant the department could be substituted as a defendant -- meaning the case would likely be dismissed -- but officials later decided to reverse that decision.
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“Although the statements themselves were made in a work context, the allegations that prompted the statements related to a purely personal incident: an alleged sexual assault that occurred decades prior to Mr. Trump’s Presidency,” wrote principal deputy assistant attorney general Brian Boynton. "That sexual assault was obviously not job-related.”
