Former President Donald Trump spent Tuesday night raging on Truth Social after a Manhattan jury found him liable for sexually abusing and defaming longtime columnist E. Jean Carroll.
The jury on Tuesday awarded Carroll $5 million in damages. Trump fumed over the verdict on his social network.
"I HAVE ABSOLUTELY NO IDEA WHO THIS WOMAN IS THIS VERDICT IS A DISGRACE - A CONTINUATION OF THE GREATEST WITCH HUNT OF ALL TIME!" he wrote.
Trump called Judge Lewis Kaplan, who oversaw the trial, "A TRUMP HATING, CLINTON APPOINTED JUDGE, WHO WENT OUT OF HIS WAY TO MAKE SURE THAT THE RESULT WAS AS NEGATIVE AS IT COULD POSSIBLY BE." Trump also claimed that the jury was "FROM AN ANTI-TRUMP AREA WHICH IS PROBABLY THE WORST PLACE IN THE U.S. FOR ME TO GET A FAIR 'TRIAL,'" referring to the city where he was born and raised.
The former president previously demanded to have his hush-money case moved from Manhattan to Staten Island, where he received more than 60% of the vote in 2020 while losing Manhattan 85-15.
Trump, who elected to not attend the trial in person and falsely claimed that he had not been allowed to "speak or defend" himself, continued to rant on Truth Social into the early hours of morning hours on Wednesday.
He argued at 12:34 a.m. that the "partisan" judge and jury "should be absolutely ashamed of themselves for allowing such a travesty of Justice to take place." He added that Carroll was "racist" for using a slur to refer to her ex-husband, John Johnson, who is Black.
"The 'Dress,' which played such a big roll [sic] early on as a threatening bluff, but which ended up being totally exculpatory, was not allowed into the trial as evidence," Trump wrote. "Nor was her cat's name, 'Vagina,' the racist name she called her Black husband, 'Ape,' getting caught in a lie on the political operative paying for this Hoax, & much more!"
Trump's reference to a political operative appears to be a reference to Reid Hoffman, the LinkedIn founder and Democratic donor who reportedly funded Carroll's lawsuit.
Around 1:30 a.m., Trump once again lashed out at Kaplan in a post, writing that the judge hated him "more than humanly possible."
"He is a terrible person, completely biased, and should have RECUSED himself when asked to do so. He quickly refused!" he wrote. "This case should never have been allowed to be tried in this completely partisan venue, perhaps the worst for me in the Nation! The whole Rigged Hoax is yet another TRAVESTY OF JUSTICE, a continuation of the greatest political Witch Hunt of all time!!!"
"It was unclear what, if any, repercussions Mr. Trump's after-action comments might incur," according to The New York Times, which noted that Kaplan issued a warning about his rhetoric during the trial before a jury awarded Carroll $3 million in damages after Trump called her a liar.
"Presumably he can be sued again," The Intercept's Ryan Grim tweeted, "it's not like Reid Hoffman is out of money."
