‘Donald Trump raped me…’: Who is E Jean Carroll, the writer suing the former US president for alleged sexual assault?
‘Donald Trump raped me…’: Who is E Jean Carroll, the writer suing the former US president for alleged sexual assault?
“I’m here because Donald Trump raped me, and when I wrote about it, he said it didn’t happen.” This haunting statement was made by writer E Jean Carroll. She took a stand on Wednesday in her battery and defamation suit, testifying in detail about the alleged sexual assault in a New York City department store.
E Jean Carroll is seeking damages for battery after Trump allegedly raped her in 1996 and for defamation after he accused her of lying when she wrote about it in a book.
She said that the assault left her unable to have any romantic relationship and Trump’s denials “shattered” her reputation. “I’m here to try and get my life back,” she told the jury.
Trump has denied the accusations.
Who is E Jean Carroll and what happened between her and Trump? What is the trial? We take a look.
What do we know about E Jean Carroll?
E Jean Carroll is a writer and former columnist at Elle Magazine. Until she accused Trump of sexual assault, she was best known for her advice column, where she spoke about sex, success, and love among other things.
Carroll earned repute for her forthright writing and her compassionate replies to readers seeking advice. She was a strong believer that women should not build their lives around men.
Now 80, Carrol said that Elle fired her in 2019 because of her ongoing dispute with Trump.
The author was born in Detroit and grew up in Indiana in the United States as Betty Jean Carroll. She studied at Indiana University, where she was crowned Miss Indiana University in 1963, according to a report in The New York Times (NYT).
Carroll was always passionate about writing. She told USA Today during an interview in 2019 that she sent story pitches to publications when she was 12.
The author changed her name to Elizabeth Jean and later shortened it to “E Jean” for her first byline in Esquire. She wrote for leading magazines Rolling Stone and Playboy, where she was the first woman contribution editor.
Carroll lived in Montana with her first husband Steve Byers and came to New York City in 1983 to interview American Fran Leibowitz for a cover article in Outside magazine. It was one of her first big gigs.
Manhattan left her enchanted and she decided to leave her husband and move. There was no looking back thereafter.
Carroll’s writing spoke for her. She came to be known for her first-person narratives and was dubbed by The New York Times as “feminism’s answer to Hunter S Thompson”.
Carroll carved a niche in television, writing for “Saturday Night Live” in the 1980s – even earning an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Writing – and hosting her own “Ask E. Jean” show on MSNBC’s predecessor, America’s Talking, from 1994 to 1996, reports USA Today.
She was part of the glitzy New York circuit in the 1980s and ’90s, attending events, premiers, and dinner parties. She was married to John Johnson, who was a big on-air personality back in the day. They divorced in 1990.
“In the literary journalism world, she was a player, which is saying a lot,” Lisa Chase, who edited Carroll when she wrote for Outside magazine, told USA Today. “There weren’t a lot of women who were being hired by men’s magazines. And she was.”
She was a trailblazer and a known name within New York’s literary circle. Now she is mostly remembered for suing Trump and her book “What Do We Need Men For?”, where she writes a detailed account of the allegation.
Also read: The defamation lawsuit and the rape allegations against Donald Trump, explained
What happened between Trump and Carroll?
The former journalist has alleged that Trump raped her in a dressing room of the Bergdorf Goodman, a luxury department store, in the spring of 1996. She made the accusations public in her book “What Do We Need Men For?” released in July 2019, first excerpted in New York magazine.
The memoir describes the alleged assault by the former US president and attacks by other men, including the former chief executive of CBS Les Moonves, who was forced out over allegations of sexual harassment.
In the book, Carrol talks about “Most Hideous Men of My Life List: It is a list of the 21 most revolting scoundrels I have ever met”. She vividly describes her encounter with Trump at Bergdorf Goodman. After a friendly flirtation, she writes, he (Trump) suddenly pinned her against the wall of a dressing room, pulled down her tights and forcibly penetrated her with his penis.
After the book hit stands, two of Carroll’s friends confirmed to NYT that she told them about the incident shortly after it allegedly occurred.
Also read: Donald Trump Sexual Misconduct Allegations: 26 women, 43 instances, starting 1970
What did Carroll say in court?
While testifying in court, Carroll recalled being “delighted” to be shopping with Trump and thinking that it would be a great story to narrate to friends.
“Well, it was such a funny New York scene,” Carroll said she thought at the time, according to a CNN report from the courtroom. “I love to give advice and here was Donald Trump asking me for advice about buying a present.”
The author said that the former president was friendly and funny and she remembered being “absolutely enchanted”. She said that she was probably flirting with Trump the whole time before the alleged assault, not thinking it was intimate or serious, CNN reports.
The two made their way to the lingerie department, where he grabbed a grey bodysuit asking her to try it on. She responded in jest that he should try it on instead.
Carroll testified on Wednesday that she had no intention of trying on the lingerie but followed Trump to the dressing room, thinking it could be a funny “Saturday Night Live” sketch. She didn’t imagine what would happen next. “That open door has plagued me for years because I just walked into it, walked in,” she said in her testimony.
The survivor then recounted how Trump allegedly shoved her against the wall even as she struggled. He inserted his fingers and then his penis. She felt pain at the back of her head and her vagina, she told the court.
What did she do after, her attorney asked. Carroll took a pause and as she teared up, she recalled, “I always think… I always think of why I walked in there to get myself in that situation. But I’m proud to say I did get out, I got my knee up and pushed him back.”
She said that she called her friend Lisa Birnbach when she left the store, as she had not processed what was going on. “If Lisa thought it was funny then it was not a bad thing and I didn’t completely do a stupid thing,” Carroll recalled thinking, reports CNN.
But Birnbach told Carroll that it wasn’t funny, that Carroll had been raped and she should report it to the police, the author testified.
The next day, Carroll reportedly told another friend Carol Martin, who advised her to never report the story or talk about it as Trump would “bury’ her with his legal team. “I was frightened of Donald Trump. I thought he would retaliate and I was ashamed. I thought it was my fault,” she said, according to CNN.
Asked if she regretted accusing Trump given the fallout, Carroll said as her voice broke, “I regretted this about 100 times but, in the end, being able to get my day in court finally is everything.”
What has Trump said?
Trump has since the beginning denied the allegations. Before the testimony, he posted on his social media website Truth Social, calling Carroll’s accusations a “made-up SCAM” and a “witch-hunt”.
On Wednesday, Judge Lewis Kaplan warned that Trump may have crossed the line into jury tampering. He called Trump’s post “entirely inappropriate” and warned they could become “a potential source of liability” for him.
When Carroll’s book was released in 2019, the former president said, “Totally lying. I don’t know anything about her… I know nothing about this woman. I know nothing about her. She is — it’s just a terrible thing that people can make statements like that.”
In an interview with The Hill, he had said, “I’ll say it with great respect: Number one, she’s not my type. Number two, it never happened.”
With inputs from agencies
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