E. Jean Carroll Takes the Stand: ‘I’m Here Because Donald Trump Raped Me’

Magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll took the stand Wednesday to reiterate what she’s been saying for years: that former President Trump raped her in a fitting room at the Manhattan department store Bergdorf Goodman in the mid-90s.

“I’m here because Donald Trump raped me, and when I wrote about it, he said it didn't happen. He lied and shattered my reputation, and I’m here to try and get my life back,” she testified.

In 2019, Carroll wrote a cover story for New York Magazine that detailed her forced encounter with Trump nearly 30 years ago. She has since sued the former president for defamation, twice, after he denied the allegations, in part by saying she wasn’t his “type.” A 2022 New York law also allowed her to sue him for battery. 

Carroll, who broke down several times during her testimony Wednesday, said the encounter with Trump began amicably. She said that, as a magazine advice columnist and host of a TV show, she and Trump had “traveled in the same New York City media circles,” so when he saw her in the store, Trump exclaimed, “Hey, you’re that advice lady.”

Trump asked her to help him pick out a gift for a woman and she was flattered. She also thought it would make for “a funny New York scene.” She then agreed to go to the lingerie section and try something on.

“I’m a bored advice columnist. I love to give advice, and here was Donald Trump asking me for advice about buying a present,” Carroll said, the Washington Post reported. “It was a wonderful prospect for me.”

Trump then allegedly attacked her in a dressing room, forcibly penetrating her with his fingers and penis. 

For years, Carroll testified, she blamed herself for the incident and said the experience left her “unable to ever have a romantic life again.” She also wrote in her cover story that she never had sex again. 

“I always think about why I walked in there to get myself in that situation,” she said. “And I’m proud to say I did get out. I got my knee up. I pushed him back.”

At least 26 women have accused Trump of sexual misconduct, and he has denied every allegation and threatened to sue the women who’ve made them. Carroll is no different: Trump accused her of lying to sell books. It’s unclear if he will testify or appear in the trial, but his lawyer didn’t rule it out in court Tuesday. 

Trimp did, however, make his opinions known in a post on Truth Social Wednesday morning. 

“The E. Jean Carroll case, Ms. Bergdorf Goodman, is a made up SCAM. Her lawyer is a political operative, financed by a big political donor that they said didn’t exist, only to get caught lying about that.”

Trump also posted on two issues that Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered kept from the jury, CNBC reported. One, is whether the dress Carroll saved from that day has genetic material that could be linked to Trump, and the other is that Democratic donor and LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman helped bankroll her lawsuit. 

“She said there was a dress, using the ol’ Monica Lewinsky ‘stuff,’ then she didn’t want to produce it. The dress should be allowed to be part of the case. This is a fraudulent & false story—Witch Hunt!” Trump wrote. 

Trump also denied a request for his DNA to test against the dress. Earlier this year, Judge Kaplan essentially closed the book on the DNA debate by saying that neither side of the lawsuit had decided to make DNA an issue in the case.

Judge Kaplan warned Trump’s lawyer Joe Tacopina that Trump could face sanctions for the posts. “We are getting into an area in which your client could face a new liability and I think you know what I mean,” Kaplan said.

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