Judge rejects Justice Department’s attempt to shield Trump from rape accuser’s defamation case

E Jean Carroll claims Trump raped her in the 1990s

Credit: Craig Ruttle /AP

A judge has denied Donald Trump’s attempt to block a defamation lawsuit from E Jean Carroll, a magazine columnist who accused him of raping her in a Manhattan department store in the 1990s.

Mr Trump had sought to get the US Justice Department to replace him as the defendant in the case, which would have effectively ended the proceedings since the federal government cannot be sued for defamation.

But in a ruling on Tuesday, federal judge Lewis Kaplan denied Mr Trump’s request, paving the way for the case against the US president to proceed.

Ms Carroll is seeking unspecified damages from Mr Trump and a retraction of his comment that the advice columnist was "totally lying" about her claim that he raped her in a dressing room at Bergdorf Goodman in 1995 or 1996.

Ms Carroll is also seeking a DNA sample from Mr Trump to see whether it matches genetic material found on a dress that she says she was wearing during the alleged attack.

Carroll sued Trump after he said she was "totally lying" with her accusation

Lawyers for the Justice Department had argued that they should replace Mr Trump as the defendant in the defamation case because the president had responded to the claims in an official capacity. In a court filing, the department argued Mr Trump “addressed matters relating to his fitness for office as part of an official White House response to press inquiries.”

The government department had invoked a law protecting federal employees from being sued individually for things they do within the scope of their employment

But in his ruling, Judge Kaplan argued that law did not apply to the president. "The President of the United States is not an employee of the Government within the meaning of the relevant statutes," he wrote.

"Even if he were such an employee, President Trump’s allegedly defamatory statements concerning Ms. Carroll would not have been within the scope of his employment."

Ms Carroll, an agony aunt and television show host, claims that in the autumn of 1995 or spring of 1996 she and Mr Trump had a chance encounter when they recognised each other at the Bergdorf Goodman store.

She claimed he asked her help to buy a gift for a woman and the pair settled on some lingerie. Mr Trump then asked her to model the lingerie but she jokingly suggested he must try it on first.

She claimed that when they made their way to the changing room, Mr Trump pinned her to the wall and raped her.

Mr Trump has vehemently denied the claims. "I’ll say it with great respect: Number one, she’s not my type. Number two, it never happened," Mr Trump told The Hill last year, adding the columnist was "totally lying".