The United States Supreme Court closed on Monday one of the appeal routes for President Donald Trump in his prolonged legal dispute with writer E. Jean Carroll, by rejecting the president’s request for the court to reconsider its decision not to review a civil ruling for more than US$5 million.
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The resolution, adopted without any dissent, means that the jury verdict stands firm and that Trump will no longer be able to appeal to the Supreme Court in this specific case.
According to the American network CNN, the Republican leader had requested that the judges reconsider a decision made in June, when the highest court had already refused to review his appeal.
The amount set by the lower court has already been paid by Trump. Carroll received approximately US$5.6 million, including accumulated interest, after the Supreme Court initially rejected the appeal in June.
The case dates back to a lawsuit filed by Carroll in 2022, after New York approved legislation allowing victims of sexual abuse to file civil actions for incidents that occurred in the past.
Carroll accused Trump of sexually assaulting her in the 1990s, in a dressing room of the Bergdorf Goodman department store in Manhattan. She also sued him for defamation due to statements in which the – then – former president denied the accusations and claimed that the writer had fabricated the story.
In May 2023, a federal jury found that Trump was responsible for sexual abuse and defamation, although it did not find the specific accusation of rape proven. The court set total compensation of US$5 million between compensatory and punitive damages.
Trump’s lawyers questioned the conduct of federal judge Lewis Kaplan during the process and argued, among other points, that the jury should not have heard testimonies from other women who had accused the president of sexual assaults nor seen the record of his 2005 comments known as “Access Hollywood.”
The Second Circuit Court of Appeals later confirmed the verdict and rejected Trump’s arguments for a new trial. In June 2025, the court also rejected that the case be reviewed by all its judges.
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Carroll’s lawyer, Roberta Kaplan, valued the Supreme Court’s decision and stated that the ruling can no longer be challenged judicially.
“We are pleased that the United States Supreme Court has again declined to hear this case,” she said in a statement cited by American media.
From Trump’s circle, however, his lawyers again described the process as a “political persecution” and defended the president against what they described as a campaign funded by his adversaries.
Monday’s decision has a limited scope, as it closes the dispute related to the US$5 million verdict, but does not end all litigation between Trump and Carroll.
Meanwhile, the Supreme Court still has to rule on another case derived from the lawsuit Carroll originally filed in 2019, for defamatory statements made by Trump after she made her accusations public.
In that case, a jury determined in January 2024 that Trump had to pay Carroll US$83.3 million for defamation.
The Second Circuit later confirmed the ruling and Trump has continued trying to overturn it, among other arguments through challenges related to presidential immunity for statements made during his first term.
Therefore, although the resolution announced this Monday represents a new judicial setback for Trump, the legal battle with Carroll still keeps a second front open before the highest U.S. court.
