During a 2022 deposition for E. Jean Carroll's defamation lawsuit against Donald Trump, he mistakenly identified Carroll as his ex-wife Marla Maples in an old photo.
During the deposition, Carroll's lawyer, Roberta Kaplan, showed Trump a black-and-white photograph from a 1987 event. The photo showed Trump, his then-wife Ivana Trump, E. Jean Carroll, and her then-husband, John Johnson.
According to a transcript and video footage later released to the public, the following exchange took place:
- Trump: (Pointing at Carroll) "I don't even know who the woman—let's see, I don't know who—it's Marla."
- Kaplan: "You're saying Marla's in this photo?"
- Trump: "That's Marla, yeah. That's my wife."
- Alina Habba (Trump's lawyer): (Interjecting) "No, that's Carroll."
- Trump: "Oh, I see. Is that Carroll? Because it's very blurry."
The moment was seen as potentially undermining his defense that Carroll was "not his type," and a video of the deposition was later played for the jury at trial.
E. Jean Carroll filed a defamation lawsuit against Trump after he denied her 2019 allegation that he had sexually assaulted her in a department store dressing room in the 1990s. In 2022, she filed a second lawsuit under New York's Adult Survivors Act, including a battery charge.
Trump had repeatedly denied Carroll's claims by stating that he had never met her and that she was "not his type."
In May 2023, the jury in the first trial found Trump liable for sexual abuse and defamation, awarding Carroll $5 million.
In January 2024, a second jury awarded Carroll an additional $83.3 million in damages for defamation, based in part on evidence that included Trump's continued public attacks and the deposition video.
Last week an appeals court upheld the $83.3 million damages saying it was “fair.”
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit also rejected Trump's arguments, including his claim of presidential immunity.
Carroll, the longtime advice columnist successfully sued Donald Trump for sexual abuse and defamation, is back in the public spotlight with the release of her new memoir, Not My Type: One Woman vs. a President. The book recounts her years-long legal struggle with the former president while also examining how image, memory, and credibility shaped her case.
In Not My Type, Carroll writes candidly about her concern that jurors might not take her seriously. At one point, she recalls cutting her hair into the same bob she wore in 1996, hoping to persuade jurors she was “attractive enough to assault,” a strategy she admits reveals how appearance can weigh heavily in sexual assault trials.
The memoir provides an unflinching account of how sexual assault survivors face skepticism and are attacked, particularly when they come forward later in life.
Guest:
E. Jean Carroll is an American journalist, author, and advice columnist known for her decades-long career at Elle magazine and for successfully suing former U.S. President Donald Trump for defamation and sexual abuse. In 2019, she published a memoir titled What Do We Need Men For? A Modest Proposal, and her 2025 book, Not My Type: One Woman Against a President, became a New York Times bestseller.
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This interview will be recorded live Tuesday, September 16, 2025.
