‘It’s all a scam’: Trump invalidates E. Jean Carroll verdict

Donald Trump on Tuesday night described his sexual assault conviction as a “fraud” and insisted he was denied a fair trial by a biased Manhattan jury and judge.

The 76-year-old was found guilty of sexually assaulting journalist E. Jean Carroll at a New York City department store in the mid-1990s, and defaming her when he said she lied. He was acquitted of rape in the civil trial, but ordered to pay $5 million in damages.

Trump posted a series of three videos on his Truth Social network Tuesday evening condemning the verdict and urging that he appeal.

“It’s all a scam,” he said.

“And it’s a shame, and it’s a shame for our country.”

E. Jean Carroll, the journalist who accused Trump of sexually assaulting her in the dressing room of a Manhattan department store in the mid-1990s, leaves court on Tuesday

Trump reiterated his earlier claim that his trial was not fair because it was held in his hometown of New York City, in the borough of Manhattan, where he lived for most of his adult life.

Manhattan is a staunchly Democratic borough and the former president is universally hated in his hometown.

“What more can you expect from a Trump-hating Clinton-appointed judge who went out of his way to ensure that the outcome of this trial was as negative as possible,” he asked.

Speaking to and presiding over a jury from an anti-Trump area, which to me is probably the worst place in the United States to get a fair trial.

“We are appealing this decision. It is a shame. I don’t even know who this woman is. I have no idea who she is, where she comes from.’

Trump said the trial was just the latest in a long line of politically motivated attacks on him.

He has cited the Carroll trial in campaign fund emails as evidence of what he portrays as a Democratic plot. He has said Carroll, a former Elle magazine columnist and a registered Democrat, fabricated the allegations to try to boost sales of her 2019 memoir and hurt him politically.

“This is another scam. It’s a political witch hunt,” he said.

“And somehow we’re going to have to fight this stuff.

“We cannot let our country go into this abyss. This is disgraceful.’

He also referred to her funding.

Before the trial began, it emerged that Democratic donor Reid Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn, had paid her legal fees. A philanthropic adviser to Hoffman defended the donation, saying the grant was made before Carroll sued “and we didn’t know that our funding would go to her in particular.”

Trump’s lawyers tried, but failed, to delay the case.

‘You have someone running for office; you have a woman being funded — and lied about it, she totally lied about it — by Democratic operatives, like just about the greatest out there,” Trump said Tuesday.

She said that wasn’t true. They discovered that she had lied about it. And the judge wouldn’t even, I think, let it be put in evidence.

“It’s all a scam. And it’s a shame, and it’s a shame for our country.’

In a second video, he simply said, “This was a very unfair trial – that’s all you have to say.”

In his third and final clip, he says, “I have absolutely no idea who this woman is.

“The verdict is a disgrace: a continuation of the greatest witch hunt of all time. Absolutely sorry.’

Donald Trump said the trial, which concluded on Tuesday, was a “scam.”