The petition turns a massive defamation award into a test of presidential immunity and personal liability. The justices do not have to take the case, but the request keeps one of Trump’s highest-profile civil judgments alive at the nation’s top court.
Donald Trump asked the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the $83 million defamation verdict against him in E. Jean Carroll’s case, a Supreme Court appeal that puts presidential immunity back before the justices after a federal appeals court in New York upheld the verdict.
The fight matters now because Trump is asking the Supreme Court to review whether statements he made while president can expose him personally to damages, while Carroll is defending a jury award for defamatory denials of her sexual-abuse allegation.
A damages fight becomes bigger
The case before the justices is not a routine request to shave down a jury award. Trump’s lawyers are trying to frame the $83.3 million judgment as a constitutional and structural problem: whether a president can face personal damages for public statements made while in office.
According to SCOTUSblog, Trump’s petition asks the court to hear his appeal after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit affirmed the award. The Supreme Court’s docket identifies the matter as Donald J. Trump v. E. Jean Carroll.
The judgment came from Carroll’s defamation lawsuit over Trump’s 2019 denials after she publicly accused him of sexually abusing her in a New York department store dressing room in the 1990s. Trump denied the allegation and attacked Carroll’s credibility.
A jury later awarded Carroll $83.3 million in compensatory and punitive damages. That amount is the centerpiece of the current Supreme Court petition.
What Trump’s lawyers argue
Trump’s private lawyer, Robert Giuffra, told the Supreme Court that the lower court’s approach “wrongly eviscerates Presidential immunity,” according to SCOTUSblog’s account of the filing. The argument leans on the idea that presidents must be able to communicate publicly without fearing private damages suits over official acts.
Giuffra also argued that this is “the first case in our Nation’s history in which a court has imposed damages liability on a President for his conduct in office.” That is the core pitch to the justices: the case is not only about Trump and Carroll, but about the office of the presidency.
The petition points to the Supreme Court’s recent presidential-immunity reasoning, including language suggesting that many presidential public communications may fall within protected official conduct. Trump’s team says the appeals court avoided deciding the immunity question directly through what it called procedural maneuvering.
Carroll’s side is expected to resist that framing. Her verdict rests on a jury’s finding that Trump defamed her and on evidence that his statements caused reputational harm and fueled harassment.
Why Carroll won below
Carroll, a longtime advice columnist for Elle, filed the defamation suit in November 2019. The case centered on Trump’s June 2019 public statements after she accused him of sexually abusing her in 1996.
Trump said he had never met Carroll, accused her of trying to sell a book and called her account false. Carroll argued those statements were defamatory and damaging.
The 2nd Circuit upheld the $83.3 million award. SCOTUSblog reported that the appeals court found “ample evidence that Trump was recklessly indifferent to Carroll’s health and safety” and that Carroll faced “ongoing and prolific harassment” after the statements, including death threats and threats of physical injury.
That finding matters because punitive damages are meant to punish and deter especially harmful conduct. Trump’s Supreme Court petition is asking the justices to look past the jury’s damages calculation and focus on whether the lawsuit should have proceeded against him personally at all.
The government’s separate move
The federal government also asked the Supreme Court to review a related question: whether the United States, rather than Trump personally, should be substituted as the defendant under a law known as the Westfall Act.
That issue has followed the case for years. Then-Attorney General William Barr certified in 2020 that Trump was acting within the scope of his office when he made the statements. Merrick Garland later withdrew that certification in 2023 during the Biden administration.
SCOTUSblog reported that then-Attorney General Pamela Jo Bondi sought to recertify Trump in April 2025, but the 2nd Circuit rejected the request. The appeals court reasoned, among other things, that the certification came too late under the governing law.
If the Supreme Court were to accept that government-backed theory, the consequences could be significant. Substituting the United States could change the posture of Carroll’s claim because the federal government generally cannot be sued for defamation in the same way an individual can.
A second Carroll case shadows this one
This petition arrives after another Carroll-related Supreme Court turn. In a separate case, a jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing and defaming Carroll and awarded her $5 million.
The Supreme Court declined to take Trump’s appeal in that separate case, according to SCOTUSblog. Trump then asked the justices to reconsider that denial.
The $5 million award, plus interest, had been placed in escrow after the verdict and has already been paid to Carroll, SCOTUSblog reported. That makes the $83.3 million case the larger unresolved financial fight.
The two cases are legally distinct, but politically and publicly intertwined. Together, they have made Carroll one of the few private plaintiffs to win major civil judgments against Trump.
What happens next
The Supreme Court is not required to hear Trump’s appeal. Four justices must vote to grant review, and the court turns away most petitions.
If the justices deny review, the 2nd Circuit’s decision would remain in place and the $83.3 million verdict would stand, subject to any remaining procedural steps. If they grant the case, the court could take up questions about presidential immunity, federal substitution, or both.
The unresolved question is how broad the court wants to go. A narrow denial would leave this as a high-dollar defamation case. A grant could turn it into a major statement about when presidential speech is protected from private civil liability.
For Carroll, the issue is accountability for statements a jury found defamatory. For Trump, the issue is whether courts can impose personal damages for what he says were presidential communications. That tension is now squarely in front of the nation’s highest court.
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