Thank you for that, Jack. I would love nothing more than to watch this blow up in his face.
He’s put her through so much.. for decades. She has shown true courage and the best possible outcome would be for this to backfire on him.. Karma on steroids. I’ll be rooting for her.
Amen! Love E. Jean and she is one badass woman, a she-ro!! Her book is great.
T seems to be getting better and better at shooting himself in the foot. There are rumors afloat that he jumped into the Iran deal to deflect from the Epstein files. It sort of worked, they have had less coverage lately. So what does he do? Decides to investigate a woman he’s been convicted of sexually assaulting and puts that back in the news. Can’t make this stuff up.
I generally don’t wish bad things on people but….. with this one, I hope it bites him HARD right where he sits. And I sure as hell hope she FINALLY gets her settlement. No one more deserving. T has put her through hell.
File the date: two federal juries. Six levels of appellate review. $88 million in damages. A federal judge who told the public what the jury actually found. These outcomes did not emerge from political opposition research. They emerged from the American legal system functioning as designed — citizens under oath, evidence presented, verdicts rendered, appeals exhausted. They are fixed points in the public record. They do not move.
Jack is correct that this is the structural danger, and it is worth being precise about what that means. The danger is not that Carroll will become a political operative or a campaign figure. The danger is simpler and harder to neutralize: every time this administration places itself in the position of moral authority — every time it claims the power to investigate, to prosecute, to demand accountability from others — it activates the comparison. And the comparison already exists in the record. It cannot be invented by opponents. It only needs to be pointed to. An investigation is a claim. It is a claim that the investigator stands on higher ground — that the investigator’s credibility is sufficient to justify scrutiny of the target’s. When the investigator carries an established public record of jury verdicts finding him liable for sexual abuse and defamation, the claim of higher ground is available for challenge by anyone who reads a newspaper. The challenge requires no argument. It requires only a citation.
Jack is correct that Carroll is different from the many others who have accused Trump of wrongdoing and disappeared from public conversation. She fought a long legal battle in federal court. She won. She won twice. She watched the verdicts upheld on appeal, twice, at the full circuit level. And through all of it — through every attempt to discredit her, every public smear, every year of litigation — she wore a paperclip. A small, quiet symbol. A reminder of the women who came forward and were not believed. A piece of metal that costs nothing and communicates everything about what it means to keep showing up. That is not a rhetorical posture. That is character. And character is extraordinarily difficult to dispel.
Note what resilience does to a symbol in political culture. Carroll did not simply make an accusation and disappear. She was there for every verdict. She was there for every appeal. She is there now, 82 years old, the subject of a federal criminal investigation by the Justice Department of the man found liable for abusing her — still wearing the paperclip. That continuity of presence is what transforms an individual into a symbol of resistance. Not proclamation. Not strategy. Presence. Survival. The decision to keep showing up when every institutional force available to her opponent was directed at making her disappear. Symbols of resistance are particularly difficult to neutralize because they derive their power from exactly the attempts made to neutralize them. Every escalation against Carroll enlarges what she represents. The DOJ investigation does not diminish her — it confirms the stakes. It tells the public that two jury verdicts and $88 million in damages were not sufficient to end her opponent’s interest in destroying her credibility.
Note what simplicity does in a political environment saturated with noise. A two-sentence summary of the Carroll verdicts requires no legal sophistication to understand. A paperclip worn in solidarity with silenced women requires no explanation. These are the formats that win the attention competition with persuadable voters — people who absorb politics through broad impressions and compress complicated situations into a single judgment about trust. Complex arguments about jurisdiction and perjury allegations require sustained attention. The Carroll record does not. It is simple. It is decisive. It has been confirmed repeatedly. And it now travels attached to a federal criminal investigation of the woman who won it — which is itself a simple story, legible without context, requiring nothing of the reader except attention.
File the date: the DOJ investigation of Carroll is a choice. Choices communicate priorities. This choice communicates that the man found liable for sexual abuse by two juries considers the woman who won those verdicts a sufficient threat to direct the federal government’s prosecutorial apparatus against her. Every time that sentence appears in a news cycle, it carries the paperclip with it. It carries the verdicts. It carries six levels of appellate review, all going the same direction. It carries the image of an 82-year-old woman who simply refused to be made to disappear. Political figures who used legal instruments against perceived enemies while carrying significant personal legal exposure have not consistently succeeded in keeping attention focused on the targets. The moment the comparison becomes a reference point rather than a talking point — the moment it stops requiring an advocate and starts requiring only a citation — the dynamic shifts. Reference points cannot be refuted. They can only be outlasted. And outlasting requires that nothing new reactivates them.
Every escalation against Carroll reactivates them. Every subpoena. Every filing. Every news cycle. And she is still there. Still wearing the paperclip. Still the woman who beat him. The record does not move. Resilience, it turns out, is one of the hardest things in politics to dispel — because it asks nothing of anyone except attention. And attention, eventually, it gets.
I saw one of the bbc news shows that is broadcast on PBS in Arizona mentioning the DOJ had opened an investigation of Carroll for perjury in the two cases that had been settled, but the News reader did not mention the two jury verdict finding him guilty of sexual assault and defamation. somehow glided over these facts. This was from the BBC so perhaps the mainstream media will paint her as a faulty witness.
The two jury verdict must be made known because a partial truth, created by omitting the facts seems to be set up to be misleading. The truth must be made known fast and widely.
Whether the injustice of omitting the crucial history that two jury verdicts stood in her favor and found the accused guilty, was intentional or simply assumed to be understood, a follow-up correction needs to be printed, I should think.
🚩Laura, can you paste your comment as a reply to E. Jean Carroll on Jack’s previous message please? She needs to know so she can see that something is done about it. I believe that would be a big help to her!
If you do that, she is sure to be aware, and she must be aware in this crucial situation. It is an important way to help her.
Bravo, Jack! Your explanation is far reaching, and I expect it is farther reaching than to the type of battle E. Jean Carroll has fought and won. She fought, and you described aspects of human nature many people need to know.
May E. Jean Carroll continue to win in these recognizable attacks, and may public awareness extend to recognition of the wrongful ways anyone uses against any person, letting justice be done and the attackers be shunned in these respects. It seems obvious that nobody should support a bully, and the examples build for anyone paying attention.
I wonder where else the pattern will be met! Surely the lesson will be absorbed by bullies at some point, that their denials and attacks will bite them! Thanks to both E. Jean Carroll and to you!
Thank you for that, Jack. I would love nothing more than to watch this blow up in his face.
He’s put her through so much.. for decades. She has shown true courage and the best possible outcome would be for this to backfire on him.. Karma on steroids. I’ll be rooting for her.
Fingers crossed..
#Holdfast
~Susan
Amen! Love E. Jean and she is one badass woman, a she-ro!! Her book is great.
T seems to be getting better and better at shooting himself in the foot. There are rumors afloat that he jumped into the Iran deal to deflect from the Epstein files. It sort of worked, they have had less coverage lately. So what does he do? Decides to investigate a woman he’s been convicted of sexually assaulting and puts that back in the news. Can’t make this stuff up.
I generally don’t wish bad things on people but….. with this one, I hope it bites him HARD right where he sits. And I sure as hell hope she FINALLY gets her settlement. No one more deserving. T has put her through hell.
Thanks Jack!
OH, how I love this woman. She’s not in this for herself, she’s in it for all of us. Warrior Queen, she is.
Long may she reign!!
#HoldFast
📎🖇️📎
Jack is correct.
File the date: two federal juries. Six levels of appellate review. $88 million in damages. A federal judge who told the public what the jury actually found. These outcomes did not emerge from political opposition research. They emerged from the American legal system functioning as designed — citizens under oath, evidence presented, verdicts rendered, appeals exhausted. They are fixed points in the public record. They do not move.
Jack is correct that this is the structural danger, and it is worth being precise about what that means. The danger is not that Carroll will become a political operative or a campaign figure. The danger is simpler and harder to neutralize: every time this administration places itself in the position of moral authority — every time it claims the power to investigate, to prosecute, to demand accountability from others — it activates the comparison. And the comparison already exists in the record. It cannot be invented by opponents. It only needs to be pointed to. An investigation is a claim. It is a claim that the investigator stands on higher ground — that the investigator’s credibility is sufficient to justify scrutiny of the target’s. When the investigator carries an established public record of jury verdicts finding him liable for sexual abuse and defamation, the claim of higher ground is available for challenge by anyone who reads a newspaper. The challenge requires no argument. It requires only a citation.
Jack is correct that Carroll is different from the many others who have accused Trump of wrongdoing and disappeared from public conversation. She fought a long legal battle in federal court. She won. She won twice. She watched the verdicts upheld on appeal, twice, at the full circuit level. And through all of it — through every attempt to discredit her, every public smear, every year of litigation — she wore a paperclip. A small, quiet symbol. A reminder of the women who came forward and were not believed. A piece of metal that costs nothing and communicates everything about what it means to keep showing up. That is not a rhetorical posture. That is character. And character is extraordinarily difficult to dispel.
Note what resilience does to a symbol in political culture. Carroll did not simply make an accusation and disappear. She was there for every verdict. She was there for every appeal. She is there now, 82 years old, the subject of a federal criminal investigation by the Justice Department of the man found liable for abusing her — still wearing the paperclip. That continuity of presence is what transforms an individual into a symbol of resistance. Not proclamation. Not strategy. Presence. Survival. The decision to keep showing up when every institutional force available to her opponent was directed at making her disappear. Symbols of resistance are particularly difficult to neutralize because they derive their power from exactly the attempts made to neutralize them. Every escalation against Carroll enlarges what she represents. The DOJ investigation does not diminish her — it confirms the stakes. It tells the public that two jury verdicts and $88 million in damages were not sufficient to end her opponent’s interest in destroying her credibility.
Note what simplicity does in a political environment saturated with noise. A two-sentence summary of the Carroll verdicts requires no legal sophistication to understand. A paperclip worn in solidarity with silenced women requires no explanation. These are the formats that win the attention competition with persuadable voters — people who absorb politics through broad impressions and compress complicated situations into a single judgment about trust. Complex arguments about jurisdiction and perjury allegations require sustained attention. The Carroll record does not. It is simple. It is decisive. It has been confirmed repeatedly. And it now travels attached to a federal criminal investigation of the woman who won it — which is itself a simple story, legible without context, requiring nothing of the reader except attention.
File the date: the DOJ investigation of Carroll is a choice. Choices communicate priorities. This choice communicates that the man found liable for sexual abuse by two juries considers the woman who won those verdicts a sufficient threat to direct the federal government’s prosecutorial apparatus against her. Every time that sentence appears in a news cycle, it carries the paperclip with it. It carries the verdicts. It carries six levels of appellate review, all going the same direction. It carries the image of an 82-year-old woman who simply refused to be made to disappear. Political figures who used legal instruments against perceived enemies while carrying significant personal legal exposure have not consistently succeeded in keeping attention focused on the targets. The moment the comparison becomes a reference point rather than a talking point — the moment it stops requiring an advocate and starts requiring only a citation — the dynamic shifts. Reference points cannot be refuted. They can only be outlasted. And outlasting requires that nothing new reactivates them.
Every escalation against Carroll reactivates them. Every subpoena. Every filing. Every news cycle. And she is still there. Still wearing the paperclip. Still the woman who beat him. The record does not move. Resilience, it turns out, is one of the hardest things in politics to dispel — because it asks nothing of anyone except attention. And attention, eventually, it gets.
Jack is correct. File the date.
#HOLDFAST
When they (you know, MAGAts and their ilk) complain about "weaponization of the DoJ", direct them to this case.
And Ms Caroll (and Mr Powell and Mr Comey) should apply for their share of the slush fund, if it ever comes to exist.
I saw one of the bbc news shows that is broadcast on PBS in Arizona mentioning the DOJ had opened an investigation of Carroll for perjury in the two cases that had been settled, but the News reader did not mention the two jury verdict finding him guilty of sexual assault and defamation. somehow glided over these facts. This was from the BBC so perhaps the mainstream media will paint her as a faulty witness.
The two jury verdict must be made known because a partial truth, created by omitting the facts seems to be set up to be misleading. The truth must be made known fast and widely.
Whether the injustice of omitting the crucial history that two jury verdicts stood in her favor and found the accused guilty, was intentional or simply assumed to be understood, a follow-up correction needs to be printed, I should think.
🚩Laura, can you paste your comment as a reply to E. Jean Carroll on Jack’s previous message please? She needs to know so she can see that something is done about it. I believe that would be a big help to her!
If you do that, she is sure to be aware, and she must be aware in this crucial situation. It is an important way to help her.
#Holdfast!
Not a "how", a "when"...a little sunshine for your day Jack...
Bravo, Jack! Your explanation is far reaching, and I expect it is farther reaching than to the type of battle E. Jean Carroll has fought and won. She fought, and you described aspects of human nature many people need to know.
May E. Jean Carroll continue to win in these recognizable attacks, and may public awareness extend to recognition of the wrongful ways anyone uses against any person, letting justice be done and the attackers be shunned in these respects. It seems obvious that nobody should support a bully, and the examples build for anyone paying attention.
I wonder where else the pattern will be met! Surely the lesson will be absorbed by bullies at some point, that their denials and attacks will bite them! Thanks to both E. Jean Carroll and to you!
#Holdfast!
We will never forget when tRUMP testafied when your a Star they let you abuse people sexually. Epstein trained tRUMP in the art of sexual abuse.