Trump’s motion to dismiss E. Jean Carroll’s lawsuit denied

Motion denied.

That was the decision issued by New York State Supreme Court Justice Doris Ling-Cohan Jan. 6, when she responded to President Donald J. Trump’s motion to dismiss E. Jean Carroll’s defamation lawsuit.

In the months following her summer 2019 allegations that Trump raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room circa 1996, advice columnist and Warwick resident E. Jean Carroll says he made numerous false and defamatory statements about her.

Carroll filed a lawsuit in state Supreme Court Nov. 4 against Trump, alleging his statements “inflicted emotional pain and suffering, damaged her reputation and caused substantial professional harm,” according to the complaint.

Ling-Cohan rejected Trump’s argument that New York’s courts lack jurisdiction in the case because he was not in New York and did not live in the state when he made his comments about Carroll.

“Notably, there is not even a tweet, much less an affidavit by defendant Trump in support of his motion,” the justice said.

Trump’s lawyer pointed to the fact that “the President of the United States has resided in the White House for the past three years” as support for his argument that New York lacks jurisdiction.

It was not immediately clear who was representing Trump in the case.

Trump’s accompanying request that discovery in the case be stayed was also denied.

Roberta Kaplan, of Kaplan Hecker & Fink, and counsel for Carroll, welcomed the justice’s decision.

“We are pleased, and unsurprised, that the court refused to tolerate Donald Trump’s latest attempt to avoid discovery in our client’s case,” Kaplan said. “We look forward to moving ahead in this case and proving that Donald Trump lied when he told the world that he did not rape our client and had not even met her.”

On her Twitter feed, Carroll seemed upbeat.

“WE MOVE AHEAD!!” she said.

In a statement at the time of the lawsuit’s filing, Carroll said that her legal action wasn’t just about her.

“I am filing this lawsuit for every woman who’s been pinched, prodded, cornered, felt-up, pushed against a wall, grabbed, groped, assaulted, and has spoken up only to be shamed, demeaned, disgraced, passed over for promotion, fired and forgotten,” she said. “Born a baby girl of the Silent Generation, I was taught to laugh off sexual violence and believe that being raped was my own fault.”

Carroll went on to say that now, as a grown woman, she’s taking Trump to task for lying about the alleged incident.

“While I can no longer hold Donald Trump accountable for assaulting me more than 20 years ago, I can hold him accountable for lying about it and I fully intend to do so,” she said. “No one, not even the president, is above the law.”