Even though he was president at the time, Donald Trump wasn’t acting under his presidential duties in 2019 when he denied sexually assaulting writer E. Jean Carroll. It sounds obvious enough, but the federal government only recently came to that legal conclusion.

In a court filing Tuesday in Carroll’s ongoing defamation lawsuit against Trump (separate from the verdict she won in May), the Justice Department explained the evolution in its thinking on the subject.

Previously, the government maintained that Trump was immune from liability because he had acted within the scope of his employment. The department initially intervened for Trump under his attorney general, William Barr, in a move that the Biden administration continued under Attorney General Merrick Garland.

So, why the legal change of heart?

It boiled down to new legal and factual developments. For one thing, a recent appeals court ruling clarified the analysis. Citing language from that ruling, the DOJ said Tuesday that there’s insufficient basis to think Trump was motivated by “more than an insignificant” desire to serve the government when he allegedly defamed Carroll in 2019.

Of course, that selfish Trumpian impulse has been clear all along. But the government was looking through a more formalistic legal lens. Looking through that lens now, based on intervening law and facts, the government feels free to cut Trump loose, putting him at greater risk of further liability in Carroll’s ongoing legal quest against him.

Reading the government’s letter, one realizes that Trump has, once again, taken an undeserved benefit and squandered it, leaving only himself to blame. (On his social media site, Trump decried the DOJ’s decision and continued to maintain his innocence.)

Among other remarks, the Justice Department pointed to Trump’s CNN town hall in May, at which he called Carroll’s accusations a “fake story” even after a jury had found him liable for sexually abusing and defaming her. Because he was no longer president when making that statement and others similar to the alleged 2019 defamation, the DOJ wrote, “Mr. Trump could not have been motivated by any interest in serving the United States Government.” That obvious fact helped the government conclude, in retrospect, that he also lacked such an interest in serving his country when allegedly defaming Carroll back in 2019. 

As my colleague Lisa Rubin explained on “Deadline: White House” on Tuesday, it’s a significant reversal on DOJ’s part:

Unsurprisingly, that significance isn’t lost on Carroll’s lawyer, Roberta Kaplan. “Now that one of the last obstacles has been removed, we look forward to trial in E Jean Carroll’s original case in January 2024,” she said in a statement.

While much can happen between now and January (or whenever the case goes to trial, if it does), this odd legal detour is now resolved.