President Donald Trump spent three years and multiple rounds of appeals trying to avoid paying author and journalist E. Jean Carroll a $5 million jury verdict. But that fight cost him about $800,000 more.
On Wednesday, a federal judge ordered the release of $5.8 million to Carroll after the Supreme Court refused to hear Trump’s appeal of the 2023 verdict, according to The Associated Press.
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How did the money grow?
Back in May 2023, a Manhattan jury awarded Carroll $5 million after it found Trump liable for sexually abusing her in the 1990s and defaming her after he denied it.
Rather than pay the fee, Trump deposited the funds into a court-controlled escrow account after the decision to secure a stay while he appealed. The deposit has now grown to its current amount through interest accrued over the years.
The account Trump deposited the $5 million into is part of the Court Registry Investment System, or CRIS. The system is a tool federal courts use whenever a party appeals a judgment and wants to pause collection in the meantime.
Once a party deposits money into the account, the system pools those funds with money from other cases nationwide to buy U.S. Treasury securities. Those securities are then held until they mature.
Interest accrues the entire time the case works its way through the appeals process. Once a judge orders the court to disburse funds from the escrow account, the interest earned is also included.
Court case timeline
During the three years the case remained in legal limbo, Trump exhausted nearly every available avenue to deny Carroll the money.
Trump first appealed to the district court, then to the U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, before sending the case to the U.S. Supreme Court. The justices declined to hear the case late last month.
Federal Judge Lewis A. Kaplan then moved to have the funds disbursed. But Trump’s lawyers argued the president shouldn’t have to pay because they are weighing a request asking the Supreme Court to reconsider its denial.
Kaplan rejected the argument and ordered the money released. Trump’s lawyers have appealed that ruling to the Second Circuit, according to The Guardian.
What’s next?
The $5.8 million payout resolves only the smaller of Carroll’s two verdicts against Trump. In January 2024, a separate jury awarded Carroll $83.3 million after it ruled that Trump made defamatory statements about her as president.
But in that case, Trump didn’t put the money in a CRIS account. Instead, he secured a bond, now totaling nearly $100 million, through an insurer. Unlike an escrowed account, the bond isn’t Trump’s money sitting somewhere. Rather, it’s a guarantee he pays to the insurer to cover the judgment if Trump loses. Because there are no accounts, nothing grows interest, as in Carroll’s smaller case.
That case remains on track for the Supreme Court.
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