E. Jean Carroll’s $88M Win Against Trump Is Back in The Spotlight Over a Hidden Check From LinkedIn Co-Founder
More weaponization of justice?
E. Jean Carroll’s $88.3 million court victory against the president is back in the spotlight after it was reported by numerous news outlets on Thursday, May 28, 2026, that the Department of Justice launched a criminal investigation into her. The alleged probe was to ascertain if Carroll committed perjury during a 2022 deposition in her civil lawsuits against Donald Trump, specifically over claims she made about not receiving outside financial help for her legal battles, centering on a check that surfaced nearly six months after that deposition.
Carroll’s legal team later told the judge and Trump’s lawyers that a nonprofit funded by Reid Hoffman, the billionaire co-founder of LinkedIn, had covered some of her legal fees and expenses. Trump’s team argued that Carroll hid Hoffman’s involvement and that the omission damaged her credibility.
However, around 24 hours later, Andrew Boutros, the U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, denied that his office had opened an investigation into Carroll. According to the BBC, a source clarified later that Carroll’s testimony regarding the funding was being examined as part of a related investigation into a nonprofit run by Hoffman.
The renewed scrutiny is raising eyebrows
This is especially because it’s not the first time the department has gone after the president’s political opponents. Federal prosecutors have previously looked into former FBI director James Comey, New York Attorney General Letitia James, and Democratic lawmakers like Adam Schiff and Ilhan Omar.
None of those investigations have led to convictions, but the pattern is hard to ignore. Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general, has recused himself from the Carroll investigation because he’s also representing Trump in the civil cases.
This is just the latest chapter in a yearslong battle
According to a Newsweek timeline, Carroll’s legal battles with Trump stretch back to June 2019, when New York Magazine published an excerpt from her memoir detailing the alleged assault. Carroll, a longtime advice columnist, accused the president of sexually assaulting her in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room in the mid-1990s, in her book What Do We Need Men For? where she wrote that Trump forced himself on her.
Trump called her story a “complete scam.” He demanded Bergdorf Goodman check its surveillance footage, claiming there was no evidence the incident happened. The store later confirmed it had no video of the alleged assault, which Trump took as proof his side of the story was airtight.
That same month, Carroll filed her first defamation lawsuit in New York State Court. The case took a wild turn in September 2020 when the DOJ, then led by Attorney General William Barr, tried to intervene.
It argued that Trump was acting within the scope of his presidency when he responded to Carroll’s allegations, and even tried to replace him as the defendant in the case. A federal judge shut that down in October 2020, ruling that Trump wasn’t acting in his official capacity when he denied the allegations.
Carroll didn’t stop there
In November 2022, she filed a second lawsuit under New York’s Adult Survivors Act, accusing Trump of battery and defamation over comments he made in October of that year. Those comments included calling her case a “con job,” a “hoax,” and a “lie,” while also insisting he didn’t know her and that she was “not my type.” He doubled down on social media, claiming Carroll was promoting a “really crummy book” and that the whole thing was a “complete scam.”
The first civil trial kicked off in April 2023, with Trump notably skipping the proceedings. By May, the jury had reached a verdict: Trump was liable for sexual abuse and defamation, and Carroll was awarded $5 million. The jury didn’t find him liable for rape under New York’s narrow legal definition, but Judge Lewis Kaplan later clarified that the verdict didn’t mean Carroll hadn’t proven Trump “raped” her in the way most people understand the word.
In August 2023, Kaplan dismissed Trump’s counterclaim against Carroll, ruling that her statements calling him a rapist were “substantially true.” In September 2023, Kaplan ruled that Trump had defamed Carroll with his 2019 comments, setting the stage for the January 2024 trial that awarded her $83.3 million.
Trump has appealed both judgments, but so far, the courts haven’t budged. His legal team has since been scrambling to get the Supreme Court involved.
(Featured image: Montclair Film)
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