WASHINGTON (AP) \u2014 President Donald Trump and the Justice Department are asking the Supreme Court to toss an $83 million defamation verdict won by writer E. Jean Carroll after she accused him of sexual assault, saying he can\u2019t be sued for comments he made while he was president.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s the second time Trump has asked the justices to nix damages awarded by a jury to Carroll, a longtime advice columnist and former TV talk show host.<\/a> The Supreme Court refused in June to hear his appeal of another verdict, for $5 million, that found him liable for sexual abuse and defamation. <\/p>\n The latest case centers on comments Trump made during his first term as president. The Justice Department wants to invoke the Westfall Act, which shields government employees from being sued for doing their jobs. <\/p>\n \u201cAbsent this Court\u2019s intervention, the sitting President is facing nearly a hundred million dollars of personal liability for conduct that was well within the scope of his federal office,\u201d federal attorneys wrote. \u201cThat alone deserves this Court\u2019s attention.\u201d<\/p>\n The documents were reviewed Wednesday by The Associated Press and expected to be formally docketed with the court shortly.<\/p>\n Trump\u2019s lawyers, meanwhile, argued that an appeals court \u201cengaged in procedural contortions\u201d to avoid addressing Trump\u2019s claims that presidential immunity protects him from the $83 million award because he made the statements in question in 2019 while he was president.<\/p>\n The lawyers argued that the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan ruled in a manner that \u201ccries out for this Court\u2019s review in this unprecedented case\u201d and called the damages \u201cgrossly excessive.\u201d <\/p>\n \u201cThis is the first case in our nation\u2019s history in which a court has imposed damages liability on a president for his conduct in office,\u201d the lawyers wrote.<\/p>\n Carroll\u2019s lawyers have declined to comment on the latest Trump filing.<\/p>\n Trump has long argued he cannot be sued over comments he made about Carroll during his first term where he disavowed knowing her and attacked her motivations for going public with her story in a recent memoir. He\u2019s also asking the Supreme Court justices to reconsider their rejection of his appeal in the $5 million verdict. <\/p>\n