Around 45 minutes of video deposition given by former President Donald Trump was released to the public on Friday as the civil trial brought by writer E Jean Carroll began winding down in a New York federal court.
Carroll says that Trump trapped her in a dressing room and raped her at the luxury Manhattan department store Bergdorf Goodman in the 1990s after a chance encounter. She was able to sue for battery in addition to defamation under a recent state law that gave sexual assault victims a one-time chance to bring lawsuits in spite of any relevant statutes of limitations.
Although Carroll does not recall the precise date of the alleged assault, not having filed a police report out of concern for the negative attention it would bring, she has been able to narrow the timeframe to late 1995 or early 1996.
Her lawyers rested her case on Thursday. Along with the advice columnist herself, they called to the stand friends whom she says she confided in, and other women who say Trump sexually assaulted them.
Trump’s side is not expected to call any witnesses — nor has the former president appeared in court — but US District Judge Lewis Kaplan is giving him until Sunday in case he changes his mind. Trump has consistently denied the allegations and dismissed Carroll as a political operative.
Written excerpts of his deposition have already been made public in the course of the lawsuit, but the video had not been seen outside of the courtroom until several news outlets successfully petitioned for its release.
It is certainly something. Watch below, and read on for key takeaways.
Trump confused Carroll for second wife Marla Maples in a party photograph.
One of Trump’s main defenses has been saying that he would not have raped Carroll because she was not his “type”. He doubled down on the argument in his deposition.
“The only difference between me and other people is I’m honest,” he told Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan.
Trump was then shown a black-and-white photograph from a late 1980s event showing himself and Maples speaking with Carroll and her then-husband John Johnson, an NBC news anchor. He confused the two women.
“The person you just pointed to is Carroll,” Kaplan told him, pointing out Maples nearby.
She asked: “I take it the three women you’ve married are all your type.”
“Yeah,” Trump replied.
Trump defended his infamous “grab ’em by the pussy” comments.
Kaplan played the 2004 Access Hollywood tape for Trump where he infamously says, “When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything.”
“Well, historically, that’s true with stars,” Trump told Kaplan afterward.
“It’s true with stars that they can grab women by the pussy?” she asked.
“Well, that’s — if you look over the last million years, I guess that’s been largely true. Not always, but largely true,” Trump said.
“Unfortunately or fortunately,” he added.
He claimed he could not remember whether he dated Maples while still married to first wife, Ivana.
Kaplan asked Trump to affirm that he dated women outside of his marriages and official relationships, given that part of Carroll’s story is that Trump told her he was at the store to pick out a gift for an unspecified female friend.
Kaplan asked if he saw Maples while still married to his first wife, Ivana Trump.
“It could be a lapover, but I don’t really know,” Trump said.
His failing marriage and relationship with Maples was thoroughly chronicled in tabloids at the time; a 1990 feature in Vanity Fair reported that Trump had “moved [Maples] onto his luxe yacht” in the summer of 1989. Trump’s divorce from Ivana was finalized in 1991.
He told Carroll’s lawyer that she was not his type, either.
Trump appeared to grow frustrated with Kaplan as she pressed him with questions about some of the other women who have accused him of sexual assault.
He responded with comments on the women’s appearances before shifting focus to the woman in front of him.
“You wouldn’t be a choice of mine either, to be honest with you. I hope you’re not insulted,” Trump told Kaplan. “I would not under any circumstances have any interest in you. I’m honest when I say it.”
And suggested that Carroll enjoyed being sexually assaulted.
Trump brought up an interview Carroll gave to CNN’s Anderson Cooper in 2019, shortly after coming forward with her rape accusation. At one point, she argued that people tend to think of rape “as being sexy” due to sexual “fantasies”, but said that her experience was simply very painful.
“She actually indicated that she loved it,” Trump told Kaplan. “In fact, I think she said it was sexy, didn’t she?”
Kaplan replied, “Sir, I just want to confirm: It’s your testimony that E. Jean Carroll said that she loved being sexually assaulted by you?”
“Well, based on her interview with Anderson Cooper, I believe that’s what took place ... I think she said that rape is sexy, which it’s not, by the way,” Trump said.
Asked whether he knew Carroll had been speaking about other people’s views, Trump told Kaplan she would have to watch the interview to see for herself.