Donald Trump’s Justice Department has launched a new criminal investigation into the woman who accused the president of sexual assault.
The investigation, revealed by CNN on Wednesday, aims to probe whether journalist E. Jean Carroll committed perjury during her two civil lawsuits against Trump.
Andrew S. Boutros, the Trump-appointed U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, opened the inquiry, a source with knowledge of the situation told the New York Times.
Carroll’s two successful lawsuits resulted in a combined $88.3 million in damages.
One case alleged Trump sexually abused Carroll in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the mid-1990s, which he denied, claiming “she’s not my type.”
The other claimed Trump defamed her when he denied the assault in 2019.
“I’ve never met this person in my life,” Trump said in a statement in 2019. “She is trying to sell a new book-that should indicate her motivation.” Trump also claimed her book should be sold “in the fiction section.”
The perjury probe is based on a 2022 deposition by Carroll, in which she stated that she received no external funding for her lawsuit. It was later revealed that some legal fees and expenses had been covered by billionaire Reid Hoffman.
CNN cited “multiple sources familiar with the matter” regarding the investigation. When contacted for comment by the outlet, a spokesperson said, “We can confirm that no U.S. Attorney’s Office has declined to investigate any case relating to the subject matter of CNN’s inquiry. We will not comment beyond that.”
The Daily Beast has contacted the Justice Department and Carroll’s reps. Carroll’s team declined to make a comment when contacted by CNN.
Paula Reid, a CNN journalist who broke the story, told Erin Burnett on OutFront on Wednesday that the judge overseeing the 2022 case said that “there were no issues” with Carroll’s credibility. The judge “blocked Trump lawyers from asking about this at trial,” Reid added.
Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche has recused himself from the case, according to Reid, due to the fact that he worked on one of the appeals related to Carroll’s case.
The case is currently being handled out of the U.S. Attorney’s office in Chicago.
Ryan Goodman, editor-in-chief of Just Security and a former Special Counsel to the Defense Department, told Burnett it was a curious case.
“This is not usual for the Justice Department to go back into an old civil case from years ago and pick out one statement in a deposition that even the federal judge in that case said was not directly material to the ultimate conclusion in the case,” he said.
Goodman pointed out that the fact that it is a case against Carroll is crucial, noting it has “all of the hallmarks of some of these other cases in which they‘ve basically gone after Trump‘s detractors as the person, not because they thought that there was this major federal crime that had been committed.”
He also stated Carroll could intend to have the case dismissed for “vindictive or selective prosecution.”
Also speaking on OutFront, former Fox News journalist Gretchen Carlson said the latest case against Carroll was “very personal” to her.
Carlson sued Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes in a landmark sexual harassment lawsuit in 2016.
“This is very personal to me that the President of the United States would be coming after somebody who had the courage to come forward and say that something bad happened to them,” Carlson said.
She also called out Trump’s motivations during the Iran war and with Americans struggling with the high cost of living.
“As a nation, I think that every American should be just really p---ed off tonight, because what the hell is the Department of Justice doing?”
Carlson added, “We are wasting time on cases that, according to legal experts, are not credible, all to fulfill the mission of one man called the President of the United States, who’s on a retribution tour. I’m sorry. I’m angry about this.”
This month, Trump won a delay in his defamation case against Carroll, with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruling he did not have to pay the $83.3 million judgment awarded in January 2024 for defamation because he intends to appeal to the Supreme Court.
Trump challenged the payout on several grounds, including “absolute immunity” for comments he made while president.
Carroll was also awarded $5 million in May 2023 for sexual abuse and defamation.
