The latest court fight between President Donald Trump and writer E. Jean Carroll reached another milestone this week after years of litigation in federal court. On July 8, a judge in New York ordered the release of nearly $5.8 million tied to the 2023 civil judgment in Carroll’s favor.
Judge Kaplan orders release of $5.8 million judgment
U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan ordered the disbursement of the original $5 million award plus almost $800,000 in interest, according to court filings and reporting by the Associated Press and ABC News. The order came Wednesday, July 8, after the U.S. Supreme Court declined late last month to hear Trump’s appeal of the 2023 verdict. In that case, a Manhattan jury found Trump liable for sexually abusing Carroll and defaming her.
The money had already been deposited into the federal government’s Court Registry Investment System, effectively serving as an escrow account while Trump pursued appeals, according to AP. Carroll’s lawyers asked the court to release the funds after the Supreme Court denied review and after Trump’s attorneys sought additional delay. A one-page order from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit rejected Trump’s request for an administrative stay, clearing the way for payment.
In his written order, Kaplan said Trump had been “stalling this case for years,” ABC News reported. He added that the verdict had been upheld on appeal, that rehearing had been denied, and that the Supreme Court had declined to intervene. Kaplan concluded that it was time for Trump to “do equity” and pay the judgment.
The case is rooted in New York and continues to move through the federal courts in Manhattan, where both Carroll trials were held. The first jury concluded in May 2023 that Trump sexually abused Carroll in the mid-1990s in the dressing room of Bergdorf Goodman in Manhattan and later defamed her in 2022 when he denied her account, according to AP and ABC News.
What is confirmed is that the $5.8 million now ordered released is tied only to that first case. It does not resolve the separate January 2024 defamation judgment in which another New York jury awarded Carroll $83.3 million. That larger award is still in the appeals process, and no final payment date has been publicly confirmed.
The court docket also did not immediately indicate whether the transfer had already been completed as of Wednesday night, according to ABC News. The judge directed the clerk to move the funds into an account belonging to Carroll’s lawyers, but the court had not publicly released additional processing details.
The immediate reason for the payment order is procedural rather than political. Once the Supreme Court declined to hear Trump’s appeal in late June 2026, the main path for blocking the 2023 judgment largely ended, and Carroll’s lawyers argued there was no longer a basis to keep the money in escrow, according to AP and ABC News.
Carroll’s attorneys told the court that Trump had exhausted repeated efforts to delay payment through multiple levels of the federal court system. Trump said on social media that he would continue fighting what he called a “Weaponization and Lawfare Case,” but the courts have now allowed the first judgment to be paid. The separate $83.3 million judgment remains the bigger unresolved financial risk for Trump because it is still under appellate review.
For readers following the case, the practical takeaway is that one Carroll judgment has now moved into the payment stage, while the second has not. Unless a court takes new action, the first case is no longer about whether Trump owes the money, but about final disbursement of funds already set aside under court control.