By Luc Cohen
NEW YORK (Reuters) -A federal judge on Wednesday rejected a petition by former U.S. President Donald Trump to postpone his deposition in a defamation lawsuit brought by the writer E. Jean Carroll after he denied having raped her.
U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan said that, contrary to his claims in legal filings, subjecting Trump to a deposition in the case would not impose an “undue burden” on him.
Carroll sued Trump in November 2019, five months after he denied raping her in the mid-1990s. In denying the allegations, Trump said at the time that Carroll was “not my type.”
Trump’s attorneys have also argued that he was shielded from Carroll’s lawsuit by a federal law immunizing government employees from defamation claims.
The case has been on hold as a Washington, D.C.-based federal appeals court decides whether Trump was acting in his official capacity as president when he called Carroll a liar.
“We are pleased that Judge Kaplan agreed with our position not to stay discovery in this case.” Roberta Kaplan, a lawyer for Carroll, said in a statement.
Trump accused Carroll of making up the original accusation and said the courts should have thrown out the lawsuit.
“In the meantime, and for the record, E. Jean Carroll is not telling the truth, is a woman who I had nothing to do with, didn’t know, and would have no interest in knowing her if I ever had the chance,” Trump said in a statement.
Trump attorney Alina Habba said in a statement: “We look forward to establishing on the record that this case is, and always has been, entirely without merit.”
Carroll, a former Elle magazine columnist, has said she also plans to sue Trump on Nov. 24 for battery and inflicting emotional distress.
On that date, a recently enacted New York state law gives victims of sexual misconduct a one-year window to sue over alleged sexual misconduct even if the statute of limitations has expired.
