The Supreme Court already has a slate of important appeals to consider in its next term starting Oct. 6. And the justices have been busy this summer resolving emergency disputes involving the Trump administration. Such emergency disputes will likely continue during the term in addition to regularly scheduled high court hearings on various significant issues. Now on top of all that, lawyers for President Donald Trump have signaled they’ll ask the court to add a case to the docket that involves him personally.
The president’s lawyers said they intend to file a petition asking the justices to hear their bid to reverse an appeals court ruling in favor of E. Jean Carroll, the writer whom Trump was found to have sexually abused and defamed. Carroll won two similar civil cases against Trump: one that’s pending in the appeals court in which she won an $83.3 million defamation award, and another in which she won $5 million.
The latter case is the subject of Trump’s forthcoming Supreme Court petition, which will challenge an appeals court ruling against him. In an Aug. 27 filing, his lawyers asked for permission to extend their filing deadline from Sept. 11 to Nov. 10.
Extensions are normal in Supreme Court practice, and in the likely event that this one is granted, that wouldn’t signal that the court will necessarily agree to hear Trump’s appeal. It’s more of an administrative request simply to give his lawyers more time to file the petition. After they do, Carroll’s lawyers can file a brief opposing review, and then the court will decide whether to take it up. It takes four justices to agree to grant review.
“President Trump has consistently and unequivocally denied Carroll’s allegations in both cases,” his filing said. It didn’t fully lay out his forthcoming legal arguments (those will come in the petition), but it said his lawyers intend to raise issues involving how different courts of appeals address evidentiary issues. Parties seeking high court review often tell the justices that review is needed to resolve splits among lower courts around the country. Subscribe to the Deadline: Legal Newsletter for expert analysis on the top legal stories of the week, including updates from the Supreme Court and developments in the Trump administration’s legal cases.
Jordan Rubin is the Deadline: Legal Blog writer. He was a prosecutor for the New York County District Attorney’s Office in Manhattan and is the author of “Bizarro," a book about the secret war on synthetic drugs. Before he joined MS NOW, he was a legal reporter for Bloomberg Law.
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