MEMORANDUM OPINION DENYING DEFENDANT'S MOTION FOR
SUMMARY JUDGMENT (CORRECTED)
Lewis
A. Kaplan, District Judge.
This is
a defamation case brought by writer E. Jean Carroll against
President Donald
Trump, as he then was, for statements Mr. Trump made in June
2019 shortly after Ms. Carroll publicly accused him of sexual
assault. In those statements, Mr. Trump denied Ms.
Carroll's accusation, stated that he “has no idea
who this woman is,” and suggested that she fabricated
her accusation for ulterior and improper purposes, including
to increase sales of her then-forthcoming book in which she
discusses having been sexually assaulted by Mr. Trump and
other men.
In a
second and very closely related case (“Carroll
II”), Ms. Carroll sued Mr. Trump for the alleged
sexual assault itself and for defamation based on a statement
that Mr. Trump published on his social media platform in
October 2022 that was substantially similar to his June 2019
statements. That case was tried in April and May 2023. The
jury unanimously found that Mr. Trump had sexually abused Ms.
Carroll and defamed her in his October 2022
statement.[1] It awarded Ms. Carroll a total of $5
million in compensatory and punitive damages: $2.02 million
for her sexual assault claim, and $2.98 million for her
defamation claim.[2]
In this
case (“Carroll I”), Ms. Carroll seeks
damages and other relief for defamation
for Mr. Trump's June 2019 statements only.[3] The matter now is
before me on Mr. Trump's motion for summary judgment
dismissing the action on four grounds:
(1) Mr. Trump is entitled to absolute presidential immunity
(2) Mr. Trump's statements were not defamatory per
se and Ms. Carroll cannot establish special damages
(3) the majority of Mr. Trump's statements were
nonactionable opinion
(4) Ms. Carroll consented to Mr. Trump's allegedly
defamatory statements.[4]
He
argues also that punitive damages in any case would be
unwarranted on Ms. Carroll's defamation claim. His
arguments are without merit.
Mr.
Trump's Allegedly Defamatory June 2019
Statements
Ms.
Carroll's accusation that Mr. Trump sexually assaulted
her first became public on June 21, 2019, when New
York magazine published on the Internet an excerpt from
her then-forthcoming book in which Ms. Carroll described Mr.
Trump's alleged assault of her, which she referred to as
“rape.” Over the next several hours and days, Mr.
Trump issued three allegedly
defamatory statements in response to Ms. Carroll's
accusation.
Two
hours and seventeen minutes after Ms. Carroll's
accusation became public, Mr. Trump published this statement
on Twitter[5]:
“Regarding the ‘story' by E. Jean Carroll,
claiming she once encountered me at Bergdorf Goodman 23 years
ago. I've never met this person in my life. She is trying
to sell a new book-that should indicate her motivation. It
should be sold in the fiction section.
“Shame on those who make up false stories of assault to
try to get publicity for themselves, or sell a book, or carry
out a political agenda-like Julie Swetnick who falsely
accused Justice Brett Kavanaugh. It's just as bad for
people to believe it, particularly when there is zero
evidence. Worse still for a dying publication to try to prop
itself up by peddling fake news-it's an epidemic.
“Ms. Carroll & New York Magazine: No pictures? No
surveillance? No video? No reports? No sales attendants
around?? I would like to thank Bergdorf Goodman for
confirming that they have no video footage of any such
incident, because it never happened.
“False accusations diminish the severity of real
assault. All should condemn false accusations and any actual
assault in the strongest possible terms.
“If anyone has information that the Democratic Party is
working with Ms. Carroll or New York Magazine, please notify
us as soon as possible. The world should know what's
really going on. It is a disgrace and people should pay
dearly for such false accusations.”[6]
The
next day, Mr. Trump made the following comments that were
reported in the national press and published in a White House
press release entitled “Remarks by President Trump
Before Marine One Departure” issued on June 22, 2019:
“[Reporter]: [Y]ou had said earlier that you never met
E. Jean Carroll. There was a photograph of you and her in the
late 1980's-
“[Trump]: I have no idea who this woman is. This is a
woman who has also accused other men of things, as you know.
It is a totally false accusation. I think she was married-as
I read; I have no idea who she is-but she was married to a,
actually, nice guy, Johnson-a newscaster.
“[Reporter]: You were in a photograph with her.
“[Trump]: Standing with coat on in a line-give me a
break-with my back to the camera. I have no idea who she is.
What she did is-it's terrible, what's going
on. So it's a total false accusation and I don't know
anything about her. And she's made this charge against
others.
“And, you know, people have to be careful because
they're playing with very dangerous territory. And when
they do that-and it's happening more and more. When you
look at what happened to Justice Kavanaugh and you look at
what's happening to others, you can't do that for the
sake of publicity.
“New York Magazine is a failing magazine. It's
ready to go out of business, from what I hear. They'll do
anything they can. But this was about many men, and I was one
of the many men that she wrote about. It's a totally
false accusation. I have absolutely no idea who she is.
There's some picture where we're shaking hands. It
looks like at some kind of event. I have my coat on. I have
my wife standing next to me. And I didn't know her
husband, but he was a newscaster. But I have no idea who she
is-none whatsoever.
“It's a false accusation and it's a disgrace
that a magazine like New York-which is one of the reasons
it's failing. People don't read it anymore, so
they're trying to get readership by using me. It's
not good.
“You know, there were cases that the mainstream media
didn't pick up. And I don't know if you've seen
them. And they were put on Fox. But there were numerous cases
where women were paid money to say bad things about me. You
can't do that. You can't do that. And those women did
wrong things-that women were actually paid money to say bad
things about me.
“But here's a case, it's an absolute disgrace
that she's allowed to do that.”[7]
Finally,
on June 24, 2019, Mr. Trump stated in an interview with the
newspaper The Hill: “I'll say it with
great respect: Number one, she's not my type. Number two,
it never happened. It never happened,
OK?”[8]
Ms.
Carroll's Defamation Claim
Ms.
Carroll initiated this lawsuit against Mr. Trump in November
2019 for defaming her in these statements. The case
originally began in a state court in New York before being
removed to this Court for reasons explained in the
Court's previous decisions.[9] Ms. Carroll alleges that:
“When [her] account [of the alleged assault] was
published, Trump lashed out with a series of false and
defamatory statements. He denied the sexual assault. But
there was more: he also denied ever having met Carroll or
even knowing who she was. Through express statements and
deliberate implications, he accused Carroll of fabricating
her allegations in order to increase book sales, carry out a
political agenda, advance a conspiracy with the Democratic
Party, and make money. He also
deliberately implied that she had falsely accused other men
of assault. For good measure, he insulted her physical
appearance.”[10]
The
core of Ms. Carroll's defamation claim is that Mr. Trump
lied in accusing her of fabricating her sexual assault
allegation against him in order to increase sales of her book
and for other improper purposes and that he thus caused Ms.
Carroll professional and reputational harm as well as
emotional pain and suffering.
In his
formal answer to Ms. Carroll's complaint, which
originally was filed in state court in February 2020, Mr.
Trump raised nine affirmative defenses, including as relevant
here that:
• “[t]he [c]omplaint fails to state a cause of
action,”
• “Plaintiff's claim is barred because
defendant is immune, under the Supremacy Clause of the United
States Constitution, from suit in state court while serving
as President of the United States,”
• “[t]he allegedly defamatory statements are
privileged or protected by one or more immunities, including,
but not limited to, under the Constitution of the United
States,”
• “Plaintiff is not entitled to punitive damages
as a matter of law,”
• “Plaintiff has not sufficiently alleged
defamation per se,” and
• “Plaintiff has failed to plead damages with the
required specificity.”[11]
Noticeably
missing from this list is any mention of the absolute
presidential immunity defense that Mr. Trump now asserts for
the first time.[12]
The
standards for summary judgment are well established. In
brief:
“Summary judgment may be granted only where there is no
genuine issue as to any material fact and the moving party
. . is entitled to a judgment as a matter of law. . . . In
ruling on a motion for summary judgment, a court must resolve
all ambiguities and draw all factual inferences in favor of
the nonmoving party. . . . To grant the motion, the court
must determine that there is no genuine issue of
...
