© Reuters. Former Elle magazine columnist E.Jan Carroll watches a video presentation of former US President Donald Trump in court during a civil trial in which Carroll accuses the former US president in a civil suit of raping her on a motel.
Written by Luke Cohen, Jack Coen, and Padrick Halpin
NEW YORK/DONBEGG, Ireland (Reuters) – Jurors in US President Donald Trump’s civil rape trial on Thursday watched video testimony in which the former US president defended private comments he made in 2005 about unsolicited sexual deprivation of women.
Trump was asked by the accuser’s attorney, writer E. Jean Carroll, for his 2005 Access Hollywood tape, where he says on a hot mic “When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything… Snatch them out of your pussy.”
“Historically, it’s true, with the stars…if you look back over the last million years,” Trump said in a video taken last October and shown to the jury on Thursday, the seventh day of the rape trial in Manhattan federal court.
The “Access Hollywood” tape was first published in October 2016, a month before Trump was elected president of the United States.
Carroll, 79, testified that Trump, 76, raped her in a dressing room at Manhattan’s Bergdorf Goodman department store in the mid-1990s, then tarnished her reputation and career by lying about it online.
A social media and marketing expert hired by Carroll told jurors Thursday that the cost to repair the reputational damage to Trump’s remarks could range from $368,000 to $2.8 million. Carroll is seeking unspecified damages.
Trump’s lawyers rested their case Thursday without calling any witnesses, paving the way for closing arguments on Monday after Friday’s break.
U.S. District Judge Louis Kaplan said he will give Trump until 5 p.m. EST (2100 GMT) on Sunday to ask for his case to be reopened for the sole purpose of testifying in person.
Trump has not yet attended the Manhattan courtroom, but told reporters Thursday during a trip to Ireland that he would likely.
Trump, the front-runner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination, said he could not have raped Carol, because she was “not my type” and described the case as politically motivated.
Trump wrongly says “It’s Marla” Accuser photo
In an excerpt Thursday from an October video recording by Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan, who is not related to Judge Kaplan, Trump also mistook Carroll for an ex-wife in a black-and-white photo that showed him speaking to people at an event. .
“It’s Marla,” he said, referring to his second wife, Marla Maples.
When asked by Kaplan if he says the photo features Maples, Trump attorney Alina Heba said, “No, that’s Carol.”
Carroll’s attorneys argued that the episode, which was made public in January, undermines Trump’s argument that Carroll was not his type.
In the affidavit, which was taken last October at his Mar-a-Lago home in Palm Beach, Florida, Trump reiterated his denial of raping Carroll, whom he called “mentally ill.”
“You know that’s not true either,” Trump said, addressing Kaplan. “You’re a political activist too. You’re a disgrace.”
Earlier on Thursday, during a visit to a resort he owns in southwest Ireland, Trump denied what he called untrue allegations “against a wealthy man.”
“I have to go back for a woman who made false accusations against me and I have a very hostile judge,” Trump told reporters while playing golf at the Doonbeg resort.
Judge Kaplan warned last week that Trump could face more legal trouble if he continues to argue the case. He did not address Trump’s recent comments before the trial resumed on Thursday.
The trial is expected to extend into next week.
Carroll, a former advice columnist for Elle magazine, said during three days of testimony and cross-examination that Trump slammed her against a wall in either 1995 or 1996, put his fingers in her vagina and then inserted his penis.
Two of Carroll’s longtime friends testified that Carroll told them about the attack shortly after it happened and said they believed her.
Two other women also testified in support of Carroll, saying Trump sexually assaulted them in separate alleged incidents decades ago.
Trump also denied the allegations. He accused Carroll of making up the story to increase sales of the 2019 memoir in which she made her allegations.