Carroll says Trump is ‘nothing,’ ‘we don’t need to be afraid of him’

Longtime recommendation columnist E. Jean Carroll on Monday mirrored on her modified notion of former President Trump, revealing she now believes the previous president is “nothing” whom individuals “don’t must be afraid of.”

Carroll, talking with MSNBC anchor Rachel Maddow on Monday, stated she was “terrified” to face the previous president throughout the defamation trial.

“Three days…4 days earlier than trial, I had an precise breakdown,” Carroll stated. “I misplaced my means to talk, I misplaced my phrases, I couldn’t speak and I couldn’t go on. It was…that’s how frightened I used to be.”

As soon as Carroll sat within the witness chair throughout the trial, her angle modified, she stated.

“However oddly, we went into courtroom, [lawyer] Robbie [Kaplan] took the Lecter, I sat within the witness chair like this. And he or she stated, ‘Miss. Carroll, good morning. Would you please state your title for the courtroom?’” Carroll recounted. “And amazingly, I seemed out, and he was nothing. He was nothing. He was a phantom…it was the individuals round him who had been giving him energy, he himself was nothing.”

“It was an astonishing discovery for me,” she added. “He’s nothing, we don’t must be afraid of him. He will be knocked down.”

A jury final week ordered Trump to pay a whopping $83.3 million for defaming Carroll in 2019 when he denied the author’s allegation that he sexually assaulted her within the mid-Nineteen Nineties. Trump has vowed to attraction the decision.

The order got here after a separate jury discovered Trump responsible for sexually abusing Carroll and defaming her in separate feedback final yr. He was ordered to pay $5 million.

In an earlier interview on Monday with “CBS Mornings,” Carroll in contrast the previous president to the protagonist of the cautionary story, “The Emperor’s New Garments,” in that he solely has energy due to his followers.

“Nicely, Hans Christian Andersen’s nice fairy story, ‘The Emperor Has No Garments?’ That’s written about Donald Trump. It’s simply we’re those who dress him in all this energy. He has none himself; it’s his followers. It’s his hangers-on,” Carroll stated.

Carroll’s lawyer, Roberta “Robbie” Kaplan, stated the defamation trial “proved” “it’s time to stand as much as the world’s or the USA’s present greatest bully.”

“And the way in which to do this is through the use of the info and the legislation and our authorized system, to say that we’re not afraid,” Kaplan stated Monday. “And we noticed a jury of 9 New Yorkers stand as much as him simply as a lot as we did and say, ‘Not solely did you do that, however it’s essential pay her $83 million {dollars}.”

Carroll repeatedly stated on Monday she is going to “do good” with the cash and has “some good concepts” she and her group are engaged on.