The Department of Justice (DOJ) is investigating whether E. Jean Carroll, who accuses President Donald J. Trump of rape, sexual abuse, and defamation, committed perjury regarding outside funding for her lawsuits.
| PULSE POINTS |
❓ WHAT HAPPENED: The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) has opened a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll, examining whether she committed perjury during a deposition in which she denied receiving outside funding for her lawsuits against President Donald J. Trump. The investigation focuses on her 2022 deposition, where she stated she had not received external financial support for her legal battles. 📺 DETAIL: Concerns about Carroll’s truthfulness after it was revealed in 2023 court filings by Trump’s legal team that LinkedIn co-founder and Democrat megadonor Reid Hoffman had contributed to Carroll’s legal expenses. Carroll claims that she was unaware of the external funding from the Epstein Island visitor, and that her legal team handled those matters independently. Hoffman has funded a huge variety of anti-Trump efforts, including Nikki Haley’s primary campaign against him and lawsuits against news organizations covering alleged voting irregularities in 2020. 🎯 IMPACT: The investigation could have significant implications for Carroll, who won judgments totaling over $80 million in damages against Trump after civil juries found him not liable for rape but liable for sexual assault and defamation, despite a lack of physical evidence. Trump has consistently denied Carroll’s allegations that he attacked her in a New York City department store in the mid-1990s, and has appealed both cases to the U.S. Supreme Court. 📺 FLASHBACK: Carroll has accused a litany of men and boys of assaulting her over the years, including a childhood playmate, a babysitter’s boyfriend, a dentist, a camp counselor, an unnamed college date, an unnamed former boss, and former CBS chief executive Les Moonves. She claims Trump forced himself on her on a usually busy floor of the Bergdorf Goodman department store, in changing rooms that she acknowledges are usually locked and attended by staff, but were inexplicably open and deserted at the time of the supposed attack. No surveillance footage of the two in the store was ever produced. Carroll produced the allegation in 2019, initially claiming the attack took place in either late 1995 or early 1996, later revised to the spring of 1996. |
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