'It will not come today': Judge Kaplan smacks down Trump

04 March 2024

U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan, presiding over E. Jean Carroll‘s successful $83.3 million lawsuit against Donald Trump, issued a cautionary rebuke on Monday to the ex-president who was demanding an immediate ruling on his request to delay payment to the journalist whose lawsuit made him a legally adjudicated rapist.

It is Trump’s third request, according to Law & Crime.

Trump attorneys Alina Habba and John Sauer again requested Judge Kaplan delay the payment due date for 30 days, after alleging Carroll’s attorneys “contradicted themselves in a recent court filing,” as ABC News reports. Habba and Sauer are asking for the delay, or that Judge Kaplan allow Trump to post a reduced bond of just under $25 million.

“Last month,” ABC adds, “Kaplan declined Trump’s initial request for a reduced bond or a delay, but asked for a reply from Carroll’s lawyers. In a filing last week, her attorneys argued that the reasoning in Trump’s request relief ‘boils down to nothing more than ‘trust me.””

Trump has until Thursday to post bond, a total of $91.63 million, so he can appeal.

MSNBC’s Lisa Rubin reports, “Judge Lew Kaplan, faced with Trump’s fully-briefed request for a further stay of the E. Jean Carroll $83.3 million judgment, effectively says, ‘I’ll rule when I rule.'”

Kaplan wrote: “The Court is aware of defendant’s request for a decision on the stay motion no later than today ‘to allow time for [him] to finalize arrangements for an appropriate bond if necessary.’ … A decision will be rendered as promptly as is reasonably possible. Without implying what that decision will be or when it will be made, however, it will not come today.”

Just over a week ago, Judge Kaplan took “a pretty sharp dig at Trump’s attempt to delay the enforcement until right before the wire,” noted Just Security’s Adam Klasfeld. Kaplan had written: “Twenty-five days after the jury verdict in this case, and only shortly before the expiration of Rule 62’s automatic stay of enforcement of the judgment, Mr. Trump has moved for an ‘administrative stay’ of enforcement pending the filing and disposition of any post-trial motions that he may file. He seeks that relief without posting any security.”

“The Court declines to grant any stay, much less an unsecured stay, without first having afforded plaintiff a meaningful opportunity to be heard.”

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