Trump’s trial in E Jean Carroll defamation case canceled Monday

The judge overseeing a defamation case against Donald Trump has postponed trial proceedings after jurors and attorneys were potentially exposed to Covid-19.

The former president and E Jean Carroll had already arrived and were seated in a federal courtroom on Monday for the second week of a trial to determine how much Mr Trump owes Ms Carroll for her defamation claims after he was found liable for sexually abusing her.

Mr Trump’s attorney Alina Habba asked for the court to resume on Wednesday, one day after the New Hampshire presidential primary election, a request that Ms Carroll’s attorneys have opposed.

Ms Habba reported to the judge that she was not feeling well and was not wearing a face covering while seated next to her client. A juror also reported feeling hot and nauseous.

US District Judge Lewis Kaplan agreed to postpone the hearings until a later date but did not determine whether the proceedings would continue tomorrow.

Judge Kaplan also denied Mr Trump’s request for a mistrial, which Ms Habba requested while the jury was present and with Ms Carroll still on the witness stand last week. In letters to the judge over the weekend, attorneys for Ms Carroll called Ms Habba’s performance a “spectacle” and urged the judge to deny the request.

Ms Carroll had testified that she deleted threatening emails she received in the wake of her allegations against Mr Trump, which Ms Habba claimed had violated evidence obligations.

“Plaintiff’s entire claim for emotional harm is undermined because it would show that Plaintiff was receiving death threats before President Trump ever spoke about her,” Ms Habba wrote in a court filing on 19 January.

A six-page response from Ms Carroll’s attorneys called Ms Habba’s motion and arguments “meritless” and urged the judge to deny the requests.

The jury in lower Manhattan will determine monetary damages owed to Ms Carroll, a former Elle magazine writer whom Mr Trump repeatedly defamed by calling her a liar and denying that he sexually assaulted her. Ms Carroll is seeking $10m in compensatory damages and punitive damages.

The facts in the case have already been established; Mr Trump is barred from disputing that he sexually abused her, leaving a narrow trial to determine how much he should pay, if anything.

Mr Trump, who has relied on his growing list of legal battles and courtroom appearances to benefit his campaign, sparred with the judge in the court last week, drawing a warning that he could be removed from the proceedings. He is not obligated to attend the trial, though he has repeatedly falsely asserted that he is “forced” into courtrooms away from his campaign.

Following Judge Kaplan’s warning, Mr Trump wrote on his Truth Social that he has an “obligation to be at every moment of this ridiculous trial, because we have a seething and hostile” judge “who suffers from a major case of Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

This is a developing story

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