Former President Donald Trump mistook an old photo of E. Jean Carroll, the lady accusing him of rape, for his ex-wife Marla Maples, newly released court documents show.
A transcript of Trump’s October 2022 deposition with Carroll’s lawyer released on Wednesday seems to undermine the 76-year-old former president’s 2019 claim that “she’s not my type.”
The forty fifth president made the mixup as he was being shown a black and white photo from an NBC event in 1987 by Carroll’s attorney Roberta Kaplan, who’s suing Trump for defamation.
The photograph shows Trump from behind as he appears to be talking to Carroll and her then-husband, TV anchorman John Johnson. Ivana Trump, the previous president’s late wife, is between Trump and Johnson.
“I assume that’s her husband, John Johnson, who was an anchor for NBC. Nice guy, I assumed. I mean, I don’t know him, but I assumed he was pretty good at what he did. I don’t even know the lady. I don’t know who – it’s Marla,” said Trump concerning the image.
“You’re saying Marla is on this photo?” Kaplan asks.
To which Trump responds, “That’s Marla, yeah. That’s my wife.”
When Kaplan asks Trump which woman he’s pointing to, a lawyer for the previous commander-in-chief corrects him, saying, “No, that’s Carroll.”
“Oh, I see,” said Trump after he was corrected.
And Kaplan notes, “The person you simply pointed to was E. Jean Carroll,” highlighting Trump’s blunder.
Carroll claims in her 2019 book that Trump raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman department store dressing room in Manhattan within the Nineties. She cannot recall the particular yr.
Trump has denied her accusation and called Carroll “a nut” in one other a part of the deposition released Wednesday.
Carroll is suing Trump for defamation in addition to rape.
A Manhattan judge last week ruled that Carroll’s lawsuits looking for unspecified damages could proceed to trial, which is predicted to begin in April.