Exclusive: Justice Department launches a criminal investigation into Trump accuser E. Jean Carroll
Source: CNN Politics
PUBLISHED May 27, 2026, 7:05 PM ET
The Justice Department has launched a criminal investigation into E. Jean Carroll, the former magazine columnist who accused President Donald Trump of sexual assault, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter.
The investigation is focused on whether Carroll committed perjury in testimony tied to her two civil lawsuits against the president – one alleging he sexually abused Carroll in a New York department store in the mid-1990s, and a second for defaming her when in 2019 he repeatedly denied the assault, said she wasn’t his type and claimed she made it up to boost sales of a book.
Prosecutors’ theory hinges on a 2022 deposition statement by Carroll, 82, that she received no outside funding for her lawsuit, though it was later revealed that billionaire Reid Hoffman had paid some legal fees and expenses.
Carroll’s team declined to comment for this story. Attempts to reach Hoffman on Wednesday were unsuccessful.
Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2026/05/27/politics/exclusive-justice-department-launched-e-jean-carroll-investigation
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riversedge
(81,664 posts)
brer cat
(27,703 posts)
Jacson6
(2,227 posts)If she is called before a grand jury she just needs to invoke her fifth amendment right. The founder fathers saw that the gov't can abuse it's power. 
onenote
(46,248 posts)First, the target of a Grand Jury investigation is not always called to testify before the grand jury. If they are, they can invoke their fifth amendment rights but grand jury witnesses are not allowed to have a lawyer present in the grand jury room when they testify. If the government opts to proceed without calling the target to testify -- which is what I would expect to be the case with respect to Carroll, she could demand to testify but only if she gives up her right to invoke the fifth amendment.
From what I've read, the focus of the perjury allegation relates to an October 2022 deposition in which Carroll testified that to the best of her knowledge, her legal fees were not being paid by a third person. It was subsequently disclosed that a non-profit established by Reid Hoffman was providing funding that was being used to pay for some of Carroll's litigation costs, however the details regarding the funding and whether and/or when Carroll became aware of the funding is unclear or in dispute.
In any event, it is a very slim reed on which to hang a perjury charge, particularly since the trial court held a hearing about the funding issue and Carroll was not charged with perjury at that time. Keep in mind that to convict someone of perjury, the prosecution would have to establish that Carroll made a false statement, that it was made with knowledge of its falsity and not as a result of mistake or faulty memory. Thus, even if her answer in the deposition contained "false" information, if she believed her statement to be true when it was made, no perjury conviction can be obtained. Finally, the false statement has to be "material" to the proceeding -- meaning that statement in question has "a natural tendency to influence, or is capable of influencing, the decision of the decision-making body to which it was addressed." This would be extremely hard to establish given that the trial court held a hearing on whether the fact that some of Carroll's litigation costs were being covered by a third party was relevant and concluded, apparently, that it was not.
In short, this is a completely bullshit "investigation"
sinkingfeeling
(58,089 posts)riversedge
(81,664 posts)
travelingthrulife
(5,639 posts)onenote
(46,248 posts)So perjury during the proceedings, including pre-trial proceedings such as a deposition, falls within federal jurisdiction.
Bayard
(30,396 posts)Ms. Carroll is probably in the Top 5 on trump's Enemies List.
muriel_volestrangler
(106,654 posts)
littlemissmartypants
(34,590 posts)Should be a verb
Unlike the other two nouns.
Because the leader is a waste of oxygen, a fraud as a person, and knows only how to abuse everything and everyone in his path.
Jilly_in_VA
(14,641 posts)T-RU-M-P
Congratulations, you are correct! (This is the day of the National Spelling Bee finals)
LetMyPeopleVote
(182,542 posts)Ms. Carroll, who prevailed in a civil trial after accusing President Trump of sexual abuse, is the latest target in a Justice Department campaign going after his perceived enemies.
Link to tweet
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/05/27/us/politics/criminal-inquiry-e-jean-carroll-trump-accusations.html
The investigation centers on whether Ms. Carroll committed perjury in civil lawsuits against Mr. Trump, according to the person, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing investigation. Ms. Carroll won a $5 million civil judgment against Mr. Trump that he had sexually abused and defamed her, which the president last November asked the Supreme Court to overturn. She also won a $83.3 million civil judgment against him in another defamation case.
An inquiry into Ms. Carroll would represent the latest chapter in Mr. Trump’s retribution campaign, which has been carried out by Justice Department officials. A number of figures who brought criminal and civil cases against Mr. Trump have come under the department’s scrutiny, including James B. Comey, New York Attorney General Letitia James and other adversaries of the president.....
Mr. Blanche has aggressively pursued investigations against people Mr. Trump has targeted. Last month, the department charged James B. Comey, the former F.B.I. director, over a social media post of seashells arranged in the numbers “86 47,” which prosecutors said was a threat against Mr. Trump. Mr. Comey has said he did not associate the phrase with violence and denied wrongdoing.
Mr. Trump’s revenge campaign kicked into high gear last September when he publicly demanded that the then-attorney general, Pam Bondi, move to prosecute several of his adversaries. Within several weeks, a newly selected prosecutor in the Eastern District of Virginia had indicted Mr. Comey and Ms. James. But both of those cases were thrown out by a judge, and, despite the newer indictment of Mr. Comey last month, the department has struggled to gain traction in a number of cases against Mr. Trump’s adversaries.....
The Justice Department’s leadership also has made extensive use of a provision that allows the designation of cases to handpicked prosecutors across the country, regardless of whether possible crimes occurred in their jurisdictions.
The department assigned its investigation into John Brennan, the former C.I.A. director, to the U.S. attorney in Miami, Jason Reding Quiñones, because he was seen as more willing to pursue a case viewed as questionable by other offices, according to former officials.
Blanche and a host of DOJ attorneys will be disbarred for stunts like this.
70sEraVet
(5,655 posts)"Blanche has been recused from this matter because he worked as one of Trump’s personal attorneys on the Carroll appeals"! (Same link as above)
They think that THAT is going to cloud the fact that he is (acting) head of the DOJ? That the orders come down through him??
Response to BumRushDaShow (Original post)
LetMyPeopleVote This message was self-deleted by its author.
LetMyPeopleVote
(182,542 posts)The investigation centers on statements Carroll made during a deposition in her civil lawsuit against President Donald Trump, in which a jury found that he had sexually assaulted and defamed her.
Link to tweet
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2026/05/28/doj-probes-reid-hoffmans-nonprofit-funding-e-jean-carrolls-legal-bills/
The investigation, which is expected to look at statements Carroll made during a deposition, could also morph into a criminal perjury probe against the 82-year-old columnist, said the people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss an ongoing probe. The nascent investigation follows years of Trump publicly deriding Carroll, his accuser, and Hoffman, a major Democratic Party donor.....
In a 2022 deposition, Carroll testified that outside funders were not helping her to bring the lawsuit. It later became public that Hoffman’s nonprofit, American Future Republic, paid some of her legal bills.
The investigation is centered on this statement and whether American Future Republic, which largely gives grants to left leaning causes, could have directed Carroll to lie during that deposition, according to the people familiar with the probe. The investigation is examining potential money laundering, conspiracy and obstruction charges, the people said......
Trump’s personal defense attorneys have previously brought up Carroll’s statement during the deposition — and how the trial judge handled the evidence around the payment of her legal fees — as a potential reason to overturn the verdict.
But a panel of federal appeals judges ruled in 2024 that it was plausible that she had simply forgotten about the funding when she testified — and had not intended to mislead the defense. According to court records, Carroll’s legal team said they would be paid on contingency, meaning her attorneys would only get paid if and when she prevailed before a jury or reached a monetary settlement.
In 2020, her defense team had informed her that they secured outside funding for some legal fees, according to the court records. Carrol said that she did not speak with her counsel again about this until 2023 and that when she testified in 2022, she had forgotten about it, according to court records.
“There was no evidence to suggest that Ms. Carroll was personally involved in securing the funding, interacted with the funder, received an invoice showing the arrangement before or after her counsel received the outside funding, or had discussed the arrangement with anyone between learning of it in September 2020 and being deposed in October 2022,” the panel of appeals court judges found.
This issue was raised by trump and rejected. trump is trying to use the same rejected theory in a different forum.
There will be a number of DOJ lawyers who will be disbarred due to this and other abuses of the Department of Justice.
LetMyPeopleVote
(182,542 posts)The DOJ is criminally investigating the writer, 82, who won tens of millions of dollars in civil damages against the president, a source tells MS NOW.
If the Trump DOJ charges Carroll, expect her to file a vindictive prosecution motion - MS NOW
— Terry democracy (@terrydespisesnazis.bsky.social) 2026-05-28T15:03:57.086Z
apple.news/AWd2TVtmLSTe...
https://www.ms.now/deadline-white-house/deadline-legal-blog/trump-doj-e-jean-carroll-investigation-vindictive-prosecution
The inquiry reportedly is being conducted in the federal office in Chicago led by Trump-backed U.S. Attorney Andrew Boutros. His office recently drew national attention in the “Broadview Six” prosecution against immigration protesters, whose charges Boutros dropped after potential misconduct in his office tainted the case.
Vindictive prosecution motions are rarely won, but Trump’s revenge-themed second term has spawned a series of such motions brought by high-profile targets of the administration. We recently saw a successful example in the case of Kilmar Abrego Garcia, whose criminal charges of illegally transporting undocumented immigrants were dismissed last week on vindictiveness grounds. A federal judge in Tennessee found that the Trump DOJ only charged Abrego after he filed a successful civil lawsuit securing his return from El Salvador, a country to which the administration illegally sent him in violation of a court order.
Carroll could bring a similarly successful motion if she’s charged. She could argue that, like Abrego, she’s only being prosecuted for vindicating her rights in civil litigation. Indeed, her hypothetical case could further underscore the administration’s illegal animus because it would follow her successful litigation personally against the president who controls this DOJ.
As the Tennessee judge noted in granting Abrego’s dismissal last week (which the DOJ said it will appeal), the validity of vindictive and selective prosecution claims is separate from the question of whether the defendant is guilty or not guilty of the underlying charged crimes.
But, mindful that we don’t know what, if anything, will come of this, it’s worth noting for now that it’s far from clear whether the DOJ would be able to prove a criminal case against Carroll beyond a reasonable doubt at trial.
In discussing the litigation funding issue in connection with Trump’s argument that he should have been able to cross-examine Carroll on it in their civil case, an appellate panel that ruled against him agreed with the trial judge that the matter wasn’t sufficiently relevant to her credibility in the case. “Ms. Carroll plausibly represented that she had forgotten about the limited outside funding counsel obtained in September 2020 when this question was first posed to her in 2022, and the additional discovery did not indicate otherwise. Rather, it showed that Ms. Carroll simply was not involved in the matter of who was or was not funding her litigation costs,” the panel said. ....
Though it remains to be seen what comes of the newly reported investigation, if it spawns an indictment, then it’s easy to see Carroll’s case joining the growing list of high-profile Trump targets who have made what was once a rare — and rarely successful — attack on criminal charges more common in these days of the revenge-themed Trump DOJ.