The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to hear Donald Trump's appeal of a $5 million civil jury verdict that found him liable for sexually abusing and defaming author E. Jean Carroll, ending one legal battle while a far larger financial judgment still looms over the president.
The denial means Trump will be required to hand over funds from the $5.5 million he deposited into a court-controlled account in 2023 following the original jury award. His legal team had spent months pressing the high court to intervene, arguing in a January filing that "the mistreatment of a President cannot be allowed to stand."
The court offered no written explanation for its decision. It also gave no reason for the months of delay that preceded it, during which the justices repeatedly pushed back the scheduling of the case for conference, the Daily Mail reported.
Carroll sued Trump in 2022 for defamation and battery. She alleged that Trump sexually assaulted her in a dressing room at the Bergdorf Goodman department store in New York City in the spring of 1996. She further claimed Trump defamed her by publicly asserting she had fabricated the story to boost book sales.
A New York jury found Trump liable on both counts and awarded Carroll $5 million in damages. Trump has denied any wrongdoing throughout the proceedings.
His attorneys challenged the trial on multiple grounds, focusing in particular on evidentiary decisions by Judge Lewis Kaplan. Kaplan allowed the jury to hear testimony from two other women who alleged Trump had sexually assaulted them. He also permitted the jury to view the 2005 Access Hollywood tape, in which Trump made statements about groping women. Trump's legal team argued the tape should never have been shown.
The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Trump's appeal last year, ruling that Kaplan's decisions did not warrant a new trial. A three-judge panel upheld the verdict. Trump then took his case to a separate panel of appellate judges in June 2025, and lost again.
That left the Supreme Court as his final option. His attorneys filed a petition in January, framing the case in constitutional terms. They argued that forcing the president to divert attention from his official duties "threatens the fabric of our republic."
The justices were unmoved.
Monday's denial resolves only the smaller of two civil judgments Carroll has won against Trump. A separate jury awarded her $83.3 million in a 2019 defamation case, a figure that has now grown to more than $100 million with accrued interest.
Trump is also seeking Supreme Court review of that verdict, arguing that presidential immunity should shield him from liability. Both a three-judge panel and the full Second Circuit have already rejected that argument.
Trump's attorneys are expected to continue pressing the appeal of the $83.3 million verdict in the coming days. Whether the Supreme Court will agree to hear that case remains an open question, one made harder to read after the court's refusal to engage with the $5 million verdict at all.
The Carroll case is one of several fronts on which the Trump administration has found itself checked by the judiciary. The president has publicly clashed with justices over other pending matters, and his administration has faced setbacks on policy questions ranging from immigration to military personnel decisions.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, for instance, has vowed to take the fight to the Supreme Court after a D.C. appeals panel blocked the administration's transgender troop policy. Across multiple policy areas, the administration has encountered a federal judiciary willing to impose limits, sometimes in ways that cut against conservative expectations of the courts Trump himself helped shape.
The Daily Mail contacted the White House for comment on Monday's denial. No response was reported.
The Supreme Court's refusal to hear the appeal does not affirm the underlying verdict on the merits. It simply means the court declined to take the case, leaving the lower court rulings intact. But the practical effect is clear: Trump owes E. Jean Carroll $5 million, and the money is already sitting in a court-controlled account waiting to be released.
The larger question, whether a sitting president can be held civilly liable for conduct alleged to have occurred decades before taking office, remains unresolved in any definitive way. The immunity argument Trump's attorneys raised in the $83.3 million case could force the Supreme Court to engage with that question directly, if the justices choose to hear it.
Meanwhile, political opponents have seized on the legal setbacks as evidence of broader vulnerability. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, for example, has accused Trump of betraying voters in the wake of other Supreme Court decisions, illustrating how each judicial ruling becomes ammunition in the ongoing political fight.
For Trump, the $5 million payment is financially manageable. The $100 million-plus judgment waiting in the wings is not. And the Supreme Court just signaled it may not be in a hurry to help.
When the highest court in the land won't even agree to listen, the silence speaks for itself.
