A New York Federal judge denied former President Donald Trump‘s request to delay his assault and defamation trial. Trump, accused of assaulting and defaming author E. Jean Carroll, claimed that a “cooling off” period was necessary after the former president grabbed headlines after his recent Manhattan criminal indictment.
Trump’s lawyers claimed it was impossible to find an impartial jury following Trump’s indictment for hush money payments. The judge, Lewis Kaplan, said a delay in the trial cannot happen based on “pure speculation.”
“It does not sit well for Mr. Trump to promote pretrial publicity and then to claim that coverage that he promoted was prejudicial to him and should be taken into account as supporting a further delay,” Kaplan said while denying Trump’s plea for a delay.
The judge clarified that any pre-trial bias against Trump would be rooted out in jury selection.
Trump, who posted a picture on Truth Social depicting him hitting Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg with a baseball bat, is facing several criminal and civil lawsuits in New York.
Carroll alleged Trump assaulted her back in the 1990s. Trump has denied the allegations, calling Carroll “mentally sick” in testimony.
“She actually indicated that she loved it. Okay?” Trump said of the alleged assault. “In fact, I think she said it was sexy, didn’t she? She said it was very sexy to be raped.”
Trump was falsely referring to an interview Carroll gave to CNN’s Anderson Cooper. Carrol stated, “I think most people think of rape as being sexy,” while explaining why she doesn’t think of herself as a rape victim.
