Remember e. jean carroll? The former “Dear Abby” wannabe (she once wrote an “Ask E. Jean” column for elle magazine) who, in 2019 accused then-President Donald Trump of raping her.
According to carroll, the rape took place in either 1995 or 1996 – many years after the statute of limitations had run out – in the dressing room of the Bergdorf-Goodman department store in Manhattan.
The fact the statute of limitations had long since expired, she couldn’t say what day – or even what year – it occurred, and there were no witnesses or any evidence it ever happened? No problem in what is supposed to be the Manhattan judicial system. New York Attorney General letitia james, along with a complicit judge, arthur engoron, dumped the statute of limitations and went after Trump anyway.
Even the stacked Manhattan judicial system couldn’t figure out a way to convict Trump of rape. But it did figure out a way to “convict” him of defaming carroll (how do you defame someone by calling her a liar when there is no evidence and no witnesses to back up her story? Isn’t it as logical as her defeaming him for the accusation?).
But, this being hard-left (83% – 17% for Harris over Trump) Manhattan, the system managed to nail him for a $90 or so million (yes, MILLION) dollar judgment…which, as you might expect, Mr. Trump is continuing to fight on appeal.
But now the worm may have turned. On e. jean carroll. With a vengeance.
I reference to you to Hannah Rabinowitz’s article for CNN (which must be choking on its contents). Here is how it begins:
Exclusive: Justice Department launches a criminal investigation into Trump accuser E. Jean Carroll
The Justice Department has launched a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll, the former magazine columnist who accused President Donald Trump of sexual assault, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.
The investigation is focused on whether Carroll committed perjury in testimony tied to her two civil lawsuits against the president – one alleging he sexually abused Carroll in a New York department store in the mid-1990s, and a second for defaming her when in 2019 he repeatedly denied the assault, said she wasn’t his type and claimed she made it up to boost sales of a book.
Prosecutors’ theory hinges on a 2022 deposition statement by Carroll, 82, that she received no outside funding for her lawsuit, though it was later revealed that billionaire Reid Hoffman had paid some legal fees and expenses.
Carroll’s team declined to comment for this story. Attempts to reach Hoffman on Wednesday were unsuccessful.
In a 2022 videotaped deposition, Carroll told then-Trump attorney Alina Habba that no one else was paying for her legal fees. But two weeks before the trial Carroll’s attorneys informed the judge and Trump’s lawyers that they secured funding from Hoffman’s nonprofit.
Carroll’s lawyers said she never met nor had conversations with anyone associated with the nonprofit. Habba said in court at the time that Carroll’s team “conspired to conceal the truth for nearly six months.”
Got that? e. jean carroll, in a (presumably sworn) deposition, testified that she received no outside funding for the lawsuit.
But she did.
Reid Hoffman, a Trump-hating leftward billionaire (yes there are plenty of those) paid “some” legal fees and expenses.
In other words, there is no way to assess whether Trump lied about a sexual encounter with e. jean carroll. But we definitively know that e. jean carroll lied about the funding for her lawsuit.
Now: will Trump and his people aggressively go after e. jean carroll? The way he did after another accuser, Stephanie Clifford (aka “stormy daniels”) – who, instead of winning a fortune from Trump wound up owing him almost $300,000 in legal fees?
Look, no one knows for sure how this is going to play out. But tell me; which side would you betting on – especially now that the legal procedings are not in an anti-Trump venue like Manhattan?
We’ll keep an eye out for further developments.
