Trump lawyer Alina Habba likened former President Donald Trump’s New York defamation case to “The Twilight Zone.”
“It was like being in an epic ’Twilight Zone’ where no rules were allowed but for the other side,” Ms. Habba said in a Newsmax interview Tuesday.
The former president was ordered last month to pay $83.3 million to former magazine columnist E. Jean Carroll after a jury found him guilty of defamation. The trial focused on whether Mr. Trump defamed Ms. Carroll with remarks he made in 2019 criticizing her for publicly accusing him of raping her in a department store in 1996.
A previous jury found Mr. Trump liable for sex abuse and defamation for 2022 comments he made, and he was ordered to pay $5 million.
Ms. Habba said Ms. Carroll was in this only for the money and publicity.
“[She] goes out there and gloats and says she’s going to buy France and a wardrobe and a motorcycle and this and that,” the Trump attorney said. “I want everyone to remember, and I said this in my closing argument to the jury, she’s here to get a check.
“And after this, she will continue. She didn’t care about the defamation. She cared about the publicity.”
Ms. Habba alleged that the judge stopped her from bringing in evidence and told her she would be arrested if she didn’t comply.
“Unfortunately, when you block a jury from seeing video footage, tweets that prove our case, when you block them from letting us have an expert, but they can have one, we were not allowed to have an expert, we tried twice, the judge wouldn’t allow them in, it is so obvious,” she said.
“And unfortunately, that jury in that silo wouldn’t know that because they’re not allowed on the internet and they hear the rulings and they see a judge putting an attorney down.”
She said they will appeal and “prevail.”
• Mallory Wilson can be reached at mwilson@washingtontimes.com.
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