Legal expert reveals 'two chilling acts' from Trump during defamation appeal

08 September 2024

In an op-ed published by MSNBC this weekend, legal correspondent Lisa Rubin explains why she believes Donald Trump failed to show up for the Thursday hearing related to his federal election interference case since the Supreme Court's immunity ruling — but did manage to attend oral argument Friday for his team's "appeal of E. Jean Carroll’s first civil trial verdict that found him liable for sexual abuse and defamation."

Rubin emphasizes: "Sometimes you can only win by losing. And Trump knows that well."

The MSNBC correspondent points out that during "the first Carroll trial, which dealt with statements Trump made in fall 2022, yielded a $5 million award for Carroll," which, although a large sum of money, is "likely pocket change to" the former president. "So why would he care?" the legal expert asked. "Because although Friday’s argument was technically limited to evidentiary issues at the first trial, it could also impact the much larger, $83.3 million verdict in the second trial, which concerned Trump’s June 2019 statements."

Rubin notes:

Last year, the trial judge overseeing both Carroll cases, Lewis Kaplan, determined that the first trial verdict established that Trump’s substantively 'identical' 2019 statements were also defamatory and, therefore, Trump’s liability had already been adjudicated. All that was left for the second jury, Kaplan ruled, was to decide Carroll’s damages. The flip side of Kaplan’s decision, however, is that if the appeals court overturns the first verdict, it would necessarily destroy the second. And it could have been that hope — specifically, the hope of erasing nearly $90 million owed to Carroll — that brought Trump to watch the appeal.

The legal expert submits that the Carroll defamation case "plays right into the twin pillars of Trump’s messaging: martyrdom and misogyny" — which is why the ex-president "stewed silently during court so he could unleash his grievances after, all with the goal of filling his campaign coffer and pushing back on Harris’ 'prosecutor versus sexual abuser' framing."

Rubin then points to "two notable — and chilling — acts" the 2024 GOP nominee did during the court appearance.

"First, while still standing, he wheeled around and surveyed the gallery of assembled press and members of the public. Eyes narrowed, he glowered in an echo of trial days past," the legal expert writes. "Then, taking his seat at the head of a table immediately behind his legal team, he turned to his right, seeming to appraise a tall blonde seated at a table directly across the room."

Carroll, however, Rubin notes, "in a nipped-waist skirt suit with her hair tied back with a girlish, satiny bow, stared straight ahead, just as she had for nearly all of her two trials."

Rubin's full op-ed is available at this link.

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