Judge Orders $5.8 Million Released to E. Jean Carroll After Trump's Last Appeal Fails

NEW YORK — E. Jean Carroll will finally collect nearly $5.8 million from President Donald Trump after a federal appeals court late Wednesday rejected his emergency bid to keep the money frozen, clearing the last hurdle in a legal fight that has dragged on for more than three years.

U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered that Carroll be paid roughly $5.8 million from funds Trump had deposited with the court to satisfy a May 2023 jury verdict. That jury found Trump civilly liable for sexually abusing Carroll in a Manhattan department store dressing room in the 1990s and for defaming her when he denied the assault and called her a liar. The original $5 million award has grown to about $5.8 million because of court-ordered interest, which accumulated at roughly 11% over the course of the appeals process.

Trump's lawyers had argued the money should stay locked up unless and until the Supreme Court formally rejected his long-shot request for reconsideration. But the justices had already denied his petition on June 29 without any noted dissents, and the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals refused to grant a temporary pause late Wednesday night. With that ruling, the funds were cleared for release to Carroll.

The decision marks the end of one of the two defamation cases Carroll brought against Trump. A separate jury in January 2024 awarded her an additional $83.3 million in a related defamation suit — a far larger sum that remains under appeal. Carroll, a former Elle magazine advice columnist, first went public with her account in a 2019 book excerpt, and the litigation has shadowed Trump through his campaign and return to the White House.

Carroll's attorney, Roberta Kaplan, who is not related to the judge, has said her client intends to donate a portion of any recovery to causes that support women. Trump has continued to deny wrongdoing and has characterized the verdicts as politically motivated, part of what he calls a broader campaign of "lawfare" against him. The payout, though modest against the president's fortune, delivers a symbolic conclusion to a case that a New York jury and multiple appellate panels have now upheld at every turn.

The resolution also underscores an unusual feature of the American system: even a sitting president enjoys no immunity from civil liability for conduct unrelated to his official duties. Carroll first sued Trump while he was out of office, and the litigation continued through his campaign and inauguration, with courts repeatedly rejecting arguments that his return to the White House should pause or unwind the judgments. Legal analysts noted that the release of the funds — drawn from money Trump had already been required to set aside — leaves him little recourse in the abuse-and-defamation case, even as the separate, far larger defamation award remains tied up on appeal.