Trump "Would Love" to be Expelled from Court

And more musings from a federal courtroom in lower Manhattan.

For years now, Donald Trump has been telling the public — in social media posts, in press conferences and campaign events, and even in court depositions — that he doesn't know who E. Jean Carroll is. 

“I’ve never met this person in my life,” he has said repeatedly, of the woman who accused him of raping her.

“I have no idea who the hell she is,” he said during a CNN town hall last year, just hours after he was found liable by a civil jury of sexual assaulting her.

"A woman I have never met, seen, or touched," he wrote on Truth Social yesterday, from the courtroom where he is currently being tried for defamation.

This, despite a black-and-white photo showing Trump and Carroll together, laughing along with their ex-spouses, John Johnson and Ivana Trump. (Strangely, when showed this photo during a deposition, Trump mistakenly identified Carroll as his other ex-wife, Marla Maples.)

From left: Trump, E. Jean Caroll, John Johnson, and Ivana Trump

Carroll, of course, is the journalist and author who accused Trump of raping her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the mid-1990s, and who came forward with that story in an article in New York Magazine in early 2019. At the time, my colleagues and I were the first to corroborate her claims.

I have been writing about her story since then, including the two civil trials brought against Trump: the one last year, in which he was found liable for sexual abuse and defamation; and the other, happening now, to determine what damages, if any, he should pay Carroll for two statements he made in 2019, in which he called her a liar.

But this time, Trump is in court too — specifically, two rows behind Carroll. If he isn't expelled first — which could reasonably happen — he is expected to take the stand to defend himself, likely early next week.

During the first day of court, Ms. Carroll did not turn toward Trump over the course of multiple hours. Seated stiff and upright in her seat, hardly so much as moving her head, she stared straight ahead. She did not get up, and did not turn in his direction. Perched on the edge of her seat, a large brown purse on her chair behind her, she looked, as the legal analyst Lisa Rubin put it, like the “seated embodiment of fight or flight.”

Today she took the stand, facing Trump straight on. Speaking directly to her lawyer, Roberta Kaplan, she spoke firmly and without wavering.

“I am here to get my reputation back,” she said. “Previously, I was known as a journalist and advice columnist. Now I’m known as the ‘liar,’ a ‘fraud’ and a ‘wackjob.’”

Trump, for his part, glowered, snickered and could not stop shaking his head. He muttered things like “witch hunt” and “con job” under his breath — loudly enough that jurors (and the reporters in the room) could hear it.

When the judge, Lewis Kaplan — whom Trump called “a totally biased and hostile person” on Truth Social from the courtroom (Trump is allowed to have his phone; the rest of us are not) — threatened to throw him out, Trump threw up his hands.

"I would love it," he said.

“I know you would,” Judge Kaplan replied, “You just can’t control yourself in this circumstance, apparently.”

One of the courtroom artists, who had spent much of the last days staring at the back of Trump's (there are no cameras nor cell phones allowed in federal court, so journalists rely on courtroom artists for the scene) noted that he is always “interesting” to draw — because his face, she motioned, always looks like it's “ready to explode.”