NEW YORK — Donald Trump doesn’t want the jury at his upcoming civil rape trial to see or hear the infamous “Access Hollywood” tape — in which he quipped about molesting women — nor anything about his multiple sex crimes accusers.
In court papers filed late Thursday, Trump’s lawyers Joe Tacopina and Alina Habba asked Manhattan Federal Court Judge Lewis Kaplan to bar E. Jean Carroll’s lawyers from introducing the tape into evidence when the case unfolds on Apr. 25.
E. Jean Carroll in 2019, in New York. Craig Ruttle/Associated Press, file
“And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything,” Trump is heard in the 2005 clip telling former “Today” show host Billy Bush. “Grab ’em by the p—y. You can do anything.”
A hot mic picked up the comments as Trump and Bush wisecracked about soap opera star Arianne Zucker before appearing in a scene with her. The leaked tape tanked Bush’s journalism career. Trump was elected president a month later.
Lawyers for Carroll, who’s accused Trump of raping her inside a dressing room at Bergdorf Goodman in Midtown in the mid-1990s, told Kaplan they want to show the footage to jurors to show that Trump is “predisposed” to commit sexual assault.
The former president has denied the assault and knowing Carroll before she filed suit.
In response, Trump’s lawyer Alina Habba argued the “irrelevant and highly prejudicial” comments on the notorious tape “do not even tangentially relate” to Carroll’s claims.
Trump’s lawyers also asked Kaplan to bar Carroll’s lawyers from calling Natasha Stoynoff and Jessica Leeds as witnesses. Both have accused him of sexual misconduct.
Former President Donald Trump pauses while speaking at a rally at the Minden Tahoe Airport in Minden, Nev., on Oct. 8. José Luis Villegas file
Stoynoff, a former reporter for People magazine, in 2016 claimed Trump pushed her up against a wall at Mar-a-Lago during a December 2005 interview and forced his tongue down her throat. She said Trump came at her after a heavily pregnant Melania left the room and that he stopped when a butler walked in.
Leeds was among the first women to levy abuse accusations against Trump when he first ran for president. She says he grabbed her breast and put his hand up her skirt while she was seated next to him on a flight to New York in the 1980s. Leeds, at the time, was a traveling saleswoman for a paper company and had been bumped up to first class.
Trump denies both encounters.
Carroll is suing Trump for unspecified damages in two lawsuits that accuse him of sexual battery and defamation. Both center on her allegations that Trump raped her inside a sixth-floor dressing room after they bumped into each other and he asked her to help pick out lingerie. Carroll claims he slandered her when he twice accused her of lying.
Trump, who is running for president for the third time in eight years, has also requested Judge Kaplan bar Carroll’s lawyers from introducing any evidence about emotional harm she suffered due to the alleged incident.
Carroll, 79, contends she never dated again after Trump assaulted her in the dressing room. Her lawyers are expected to call friends she confided in about the assault, Lisa Birnbach and Carol Martin, who told her not to speak out for fear of Trump’s retribution.
Trump denies all allegations.
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