Federal appeals court upholds $83.3M E. Jean Carroll judgment against Trump

President Donald Trump is still facing a million payment to writer E Jean Carroll after a federal appeals court rejected his challenge of a defamation verdict against him Monday The ruling from the nd U S Circuit Court of Appeals upholds a lower court decision finding that Trump did in fact defame Carroll Trump's lawyers argued his comments about Carroll were protected by presidential immunity and that the verdict in the incident was unjust The three-judge panel rejected both of those proposes We conclude that Trump has failed to identify any grounds that would warrant reconsidering our prior holding on presidential immunity We also conclude that the district court did not err in any of the challenged rulings and that the jury's damages awards are fair and reasonable the court opinion read The record in this development supports the district court s determination that the the degree of reprehensibility of Mr Trump s conduct was remarkably high perhaps unprecedented the court added US APPEALS COURT UPHOLDS TRUMP VERDICT IN E JEAN CARROLL CASECarroll sued Trump twice after she circulated a book in which claimed Trump raped her during a brief encounter with him in a department store dressing room in the s Trump vigorously denied the alleges saying he had never met Carroll that she was not his type and that she fabricated the happening to sell books His vocal and repeated criticisms and denials led to Carroll's defamation accusations Monday's ruling comes months after the same court rejected Trump's appeal in another Carroll-related occurrence In that appeal Trump challenged evidence that Carroll s legal club introduced to the jury during the civil lawsuit including the Access Hollywood tape that surfaced during Trump s campaign TRUMP SCORES UNEQUIVOCAL MASTERY AGAINST PULITZER PRIZE BOARD MEMBERS COURT DENIES REQUEST TO DISMISS SUITThe full panel of judges declined to hear Trump's argument however forcing the president to either accept defeat or appeal to the Supreme Court Fox News' Ashley Oliver contributed to this assessment