Trump lawyers challenge rape accuser's credibility
E. Jean Carroll, the writer accusing Donald Trump of rape, forcefully denied under cross-examination on Thursday that she waited more than two decades to come forward so she could sell more copies of her 2019 memoir. In testimony in Manhattan federal court, Carroll said she decided to go public after rape allegations against Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein in 2017 prompted many other women to come forward with their accounts of sexual abuse. "It caused me to realize that staying silent does not work," Carroll, 79, a former Elle magazine columnist, said under cross-examination from Trump's lawyer Joe Tacopina in the civil case she brought against the former president. "Woman after woman stood up," Carroll said. "I thought, well, this may be a way to change the culture of sexual violence." Trump's lawyers are trying to undermine Carroll's credibility after she testified in graphic detail on Wednesday that Trump raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman department store dressing room in late 1995 or early 1996. Tacopina suggested that Carroll's account was "odd" and that it was only when she "wanted to make money" from her memoir "What Do We Need Men For?" that she spoke up. "For two decades, Ms. Carroll, you never told the police and never revealed the story in your hundreds of columns," Tacopina said to Carroll. He pressed her on her inability to recall exactly when her encounter with Trump happened, prompting her to say "I wish to heaven" that she had an exact date. Carroll objected when Tacopina said she had "supposedly" being raped. She said the rape occurred. "Those are the facts," Carroll said. Carroll had testified on Wednesday that Trump, who had been shopping at Bergdorf for lingerie for another woman, coaxed her into a dressing room, slammed her into a wall and raped her. Trump has consistently denied Carroll's allegations and said she made them up to sell her memoir and hurt him politically, a theme Tacopina touched on. The 76-year-old Trump leads the Republican field in the 2024 presidential campaign. He has not attended the trial and is not required to be there. He had a scheduled New Hampshire campaign event on Thursday. Carroll, a registered Democrat, is seeking unspecified damages from Trump, saying his denials ruined her career and invited a flood of online harassment that persists. She is suing Trump for battery under the Adult Survivors Act, a 2022 New York state law letting adults who claim they were sexually abused sue their alleged attackers even if statutes of limitations have run out. On Wednesday, Trump scorned the case in posts on Truth Social, saying Carroll was promoting a "fraudulent & false story." His son Eric attacked Carroll in a Twitter post. (Reuters)