Trump’s Justice Department opens criminal inquiry into the woman who beat him in court
Trump's Justice Department opens a criminal inquiry into E. Jean Carroll, the writer who won $88.3 million in civil judgments against Trump, in what critics call a pattern of legal retaliation against those who sued the president.
The Department of Justice under Attorney General Pam Bondi has opened a criminal investigation into E Jean Carroll, the writer who beat Donald Trump in federal court twice and won a combined judgment of approximately $88.3 million.
What the inquiry is
The reported basis of the inquiry is alleged perjury or false statements made by Carroll in connection with her civil testimony. No charges have been filed. An investigation being opened is not a conviction, and federal inquiries frequently close without action. That caveat matters. What also matters is who is being investigated, by whom, and why now.
Carroll won her first verdict in May 2023: a federal jury in New York found Trump liable for sexual abuse and defamation and awarded $5 million in damages. She won her second in January 2024, when a separate jury found Trump liable for defamation over statements he made in 2019 and awarded a further $83.3 million. Trump called her a liar throughout both trials and continued doing so on Truth Social after the verdicts. The juries disagreed. The courts disagreed. He paid.
The pattern
The Carroll inquiry is the first known instance of Bondi’s DOJ directing a criminal investigation toward a civil plaintiff who successfully sued Trump in a personal capacity. It does not arrive in isolation.
In March 2025, Trump signed an executive order targeting Perkins Coie, the law firm that represented Democratic clients against him, suspending security clearances and barring staff from federal buildings. A federal judge issued a temporary restraining order blocking parts of it. Investigations were also opened or pursued against Jack Smith, the former Special Counsel who brought two federal criminal indictments against Trump before the cases were dropped in January 2025 after Bondi’s confirmation, and against Fani Willis, the Fulton County District Attorney who indicted Trump in Georgia. Each of these moves has a common factor: the target was someone who used legal process against the president.
The DOJ dropped all federal criminal cases against Trump himself within weeks of Bondi taking office.
Carroll’s attorneys, led by Roberta Kaplan of Kaplan Hecker and Fink, are reported to have been notified of the inquiry. A statement from Kaplan must be confirmed and quoted verbatim before this piece is published.
The jury that awarded Carroll $88.3 million heard the evidence and reached its verdict. The attorney general now running the department that lost that case has opened a criminal inquiry into the woman who brought it.