Writer E. Jean Carroll says she was raped by Donald Trump in a New York City department store fitting room decades ago. She was wearing a dress. It apparently captured some of his DNA. For all these years she kept the dress hanging in the front of her closet. It has apparently been tested.
About two years ago, Trump does what he does to everyone who tells his dirty secrets: he called her a liar.
Unlike most people smeared and bullied by Trump like GOP Cowardly Lions Rubio and Cruz, Ms. Carroll didn’t skulk away. She got counsel. She filed a lawsuit against Trump in a New York state court. The judge says she is entitled to a sample of Trump’s DNA. Trump has resisted providing a sample for months: he’s too busy to deal with such matters, he says. The press of business is overwhelming. Today was the deadline for him to appeal the state court order.
Instead our very own DOJ, under Trump’s fellow obstructor and defrauder Bill Barr, filed documents in the state case seeking to step in for and replace the cadre of Trump private defenders. They now attempt to move the case from state court to federal court.
There is a legal decision about jurisdiction, which involves weighing of the subject of the dispute and residence of the parties to determine whether the case should be heard in federal or state court. The tension over jurisdiction in this case will be resolved by court order moving it to Manhattan federal court or letting it remain where it is. Judges will handle that.
And let’s set aside the issue Trump’s ability to drag this case out ad infinitum when Harry Q. Citizen would have been cheek-swabbed and tested months ago. If the issue of which court has jurisdiction is decided against him, expect another appeal. And if the court determines that Trump is on his own for his defense, and our DOJ is not his personal law firm, he may well appeal that too.
So here it is: this accused rapist and foul-mouthed slanderer wants to use our DOJ resources to provide his defense in a civil case caused by him and his big fat mouth defaming a fellow citizen. This was not done in his official capacity as president. He did not sign an executive order smearing her. There was no Congressional mandate about what happened in a dressing room in Manhattan, no public health or economic emergency requiring his action.
He smeared her in his own capacity, Bully-in-chief.
To Trump, smearing comes as easy as breathing. On one Saturday in late May he accused a journalist of murdering an employee, called Biden a traitor, tweeted that Pelosi is an addict and Hillary is a skank. He referred to Stacey Abrams as a whale.
This is not all protected opinion: when he falsely accuses someone of crimes, the statements are libel per se and damages are presumed. All these people are public figures: Trump likely figured they wouldn’t sue because they have a higher standard of proof, that he spoke his falsehoods with reckless disregard for the truth. And so far he’s right: none of them have hauled his offensive mouth to court. I wish they would.
So, will DOJ argue that all his Happy Saturday smears were part and parcel of his presidential function?
In all of the calamity, let’s not miss the forest for the trees: here’s the real reason for the move to the DOJ and federal court. The DOJ will likely argue that the office of the president cannot be sued civilly and that Ms. Carroll’s case should be dismissed. This is why Trump wants DOJ involved. (Plus he’s reputed to be cheap and libel lawyers are expensive.) Moving it to federal court would slow it down; no DNA sample and testing until after November.
BUT I OBJECT! A DOJ busy defending him on matters arising out of an alleged rape may be too busy or too conflicted to do a meaningful investigation of his continuing criming with Russia, emoluments violations, conflicts of interest and the misappropriation of inauguration funds. Oh, and all that election interference he is undertaking by misleading people about voting by mail and suggesting double ballots.
The inauguration theft is not a small matter. At last count, about $50 million of inauguration funds are unaccounted for. The person scapegoated is Melania’s former gal pal, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff.
Ms. Wolkoff made the mistake of warning Princess Ivanka in writing that she could get into audit trouble for charging the committee usurious rates for inauguration activities at the Trump Hotel DC. She got summarily fired and, of course, defamed. But she is not the one who took the money. For whatever reason, after 3 ½ years of questions there are no answers, just rumors of coming indictments of Trump pals who may implicate him to save their sorry asses.
All of these investigations remain pending: the only one Rapacious Rosenstein was able to throttle was any audit of Trump’s indebtedness and financial ties to Putin and the Oligarchs, via Deutsche Bank and associated Russian financial institutions.
So in the midst of the legal machinations and shenanigans, who will stand for The People? Who will walk into court and OBJECT to the use of OUR DOJ for Trump’s personal peccadillos? Can the public submit their own amicus briefs, giving all the reasons why tax dollars should not be used to bail out the Bad Seed. He is our president, not our wayward teenager. We need the resources to survive the pandemic and soften the effects of an extended economic crash. He needs to be on his own for this legal problem.
You’ve got to admire the chutzpah, though.
DOJ operates here like it tried to operate in the Flynn case. Just dismiss it judge, no harm no foul, they said there. Not so fast, said Judge Emmet G. Sullivan. He appointed a special counsel to evaluate and brief: who was the all powerful Oz with ability to make cases against traitors go away, toady Billy Barr or the esteemed Emmet Sullivan.
Let us in to this case, DOJ now cries. Someone needs to save Trump from the DNA test which would prove Ms. Carroll credible and show him to be a liar. And a rapist.
We all need a little Emmet Sullivan in our lives and a legal wallop that will send Trump back to Mar-A-Lago resigned and whimpering.
Judiciary, flex your independence muscle. All else have failed us. Take heed of the public interest.
Show us it’s all going to be OK.
