A Department of Justice lawyer sent to defend President Trump in a defamation case brought by a rape accuser was denied entry to a Manhattan courthouse Wednesday — because he had just traveled from a state requiring a 14-day coronavirus quarantine.
“He had traveled from his place of residence in the Commonwealth of Virginia, which yesterday, apparently, was added to the jurisdictions from which the State of New York bans travel,” wrote Justice Department attorney Stephen Terrell of Acting Assistant Attorney General William Lane.
Lane ultimately called into court by telephone.
Given the courthouse blockade, Lane told Judge Lewis Kaplan that the government would skip oral arguments and rely on the motions they had already filed arguing that the Justice Department should be allowed to defend Trump against a defamation suit filed by writer E. Jean Carroll, who accused the president of raping her in the 1990s.
She says he defamed her by publicly denying the allegations.
Carroll’s lawyer, Roberta Kaplan, said that her client was disappointed by the surprise turn of events.
“Jean herself drove some distance to be here in court today,” the attorney said.
Justice Department lawyers argued in their motions that Trump was acting in his official capacity “within the scope of his office” when he called Carroll’s allegations fiction. The government should be substituted as the defendant, the attorneys said.
Carroll’s lawyers asked the court to block the unusual request.
“Trump acted for decidedly personal reasons unrelated to furthering any interest of the United States,” her attorneys wrote.
The Elle magazine “Ask E. Jean” advice columnist wrote in a book, which was released last year, that Trump had raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman changing room.
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October 22, 2020 at 04:17AM
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Lawyer for Trump in E. Jean Carroll defamation case denied courthouse entry - New York Post
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