A Florida judge refused to dismiss Donald Trump’s defamation lawsuit against ABC News and star anchor George Stephanopoulos, saying a jury “could conclude” Trump was defamed when Stephanopoulos said he was found liable for rape.
In a Wednesday ruling, District Judge Cecilia Altonaga found that Stephanopoulos’ implication that a jury found Trump liable for rape for the assault of E. Jean Carroll may not have been “substantially true.” She noted that the anchor appeared to misconstrue the common understanding of rape with how it’s defined under New York Penal Law, which indicates that rape must involve penile penetration.
“Here, of course, New York has opted to separate out a crime of rape; and Stephanopoulos’s statements dealt not with the public’s usage of that term, but the jury’s consideration of it during a formal legal proceeding,” Altonaga wrote.
