Trump Defamation Trial, Testimony Pushed Back

(Left) Former President Donald Trump speaks during the Alabama Republican Party’s 2023 Summer meeting at the Renaissance Montgomery Hotel in Montgomery, Ala., on Aug. 4, 2023. (Julie Bennett/Getty Images); (Right) E. Jean Carroll leaves following her trial at Manhattan Federal Court in New York on May 8, 2023. (Stephanie Keith/Getty Images)

Former President Donald Trump’s testimony in the defamation case brought by E. Jean Carroll will not happen Wednesday, with the trial being delayed one more day after a federal judge paused proceedings this week over COVID concerns.

The trial will resume Thursday, Jan. 24, according to the docket.

President Trump was originally scheduled to testify on Monday, but showed up to a courtroom without a jury.

U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan told the parties that a juror had been sent home after reporting health concerns to be tested for COVID, and the trial would be delayed a day.

Attorney Alina Habba, representing President Trump, asked that the trial be delayed two days—a one day delay would have had President Trump testifying in court during the New Hampshire primary.

She also noted that she was feeling unwell, and that, despite testing negative for COVID, had last week been in contact with relatives who later tested positive for COVID.

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Judge Kaplan did not commit to a new schedule in court but later updated the court schedule to resume trial Wednesday, Jan. 23. The trial has been delayed yet another day, but no order or explanation was given. If the juror had tested positive for COVID, it is possible they would be replaced by an alternate.

On Monday, attorneys for Ms. Carroll had asked that the trial resume quickly.

Campaign and Court Schedules

President Trump has been juggling campaign and court schedules as he said he intended to attend “100 percent” of the trial after the judge was allegedly “extraordinarily hostile” in his absence in the previous case Ms. Carroll brought against him.

Last week, President Trump had flown back to New York fresh off a win in Iowa, landing at around 3:30 a.m. in order to attend the trial.

On Jan. 18, he missed a day of the trial to attend the funeral of his mother-in-law, Amalija Knavs, who passed away on Jan. 9 at age 78. In a press conference a day before the funeral, President Trump criticized the judge for not delaying the case for a day.

President Trump had also regularly attended a separate civil case in New York, brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James over claims of fraud in his business dealings via the Trump Organization. The trial ended with closing arguments on Jan. 11 after 44 days.

Last May, Ms. Carroll had won a related case that dealt with other defamatory statements and her allegations that he had raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman in the 1990s; a jury awarded her $5 million and found President Trump liable for sexual battery and defamation, but not rape.

Judge Kaplan issued a summary judgment finding President Trump liable for defamation in the ongoing case, because the facts were the same in the two cases.

President Trump has argued that he is the one owed damages, and maintains he does not know Ms. Carroll.

“We think both trials should be thrown out,” he said during a press conference. “I’m, frankly, the one who suffered damages.”