Donald Trump just forfeited

| 12:16 am EDT May 3, 2023
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Early on in the Donald Trump v. E. Jean Carroll civil rape trial, Trump’s attorney Joe Tacopina tried to play coy about whether Trump would decide to show up at the end. The judge was not impressed, and made it clear that if Trump did decide to testify, he’d have to provide notice in advance.

At the time, the presumption was that Trump was waiting to see whether Tacopina could manage to get Carroll to crack on the stand during cross examination. If Carroll completely fell apart and discredited herself, then it wouldn’t matter how mean Tacopina was to her; there would be no case, and the jury would have to side for Trump even if it hated how he approached the trial.

But the Carroll cross examination is now over, and by all accounts, she more than held her own. This means the jury is likely to not only believe Carroll, but also perceive Trump to have used the cross examination to terrorize the woman he raped. In other words, it’s the worst case scenario for Trump.

Carroll’s attorneys are now putting a series of supporting witnesses on the stand. They can only help Carroll or not help her, depending on whether their testimony is effective. Nothing from here can hurt Carroll’s case. The only way this could possibly go south for Carroll is if it turns out to be an insane jury. Short of that, she’s basically already won.

So now would be the time for Donald Trump to decide that he needs to show up and testify, in the hope of turning things around. Instead, he just confirmed that he’s not testifying. There’s really no other way to look at this, other than to conclude that Trump is essentially forfeiting the trial. The odds of the jury siding with him, after he refuses to even show up and defend his own claims, are infinitesimal. He’s simply giving up.

Why would Trump do this? It’s possible he’s afraid that any testimony he gives in this civil trial could somehow be used against him by the criminal prosecutors who are targeting him. It’s also possible that he’s concluded he’s going to lose this trial no matter what, and doesn’t see a point in participating. He also may simply be such a coward, he’s just that afraid to face Carroll. Or maybe he’s too far gone to understand or care that he’s about to lose this trial. In any case, Trump is now forfeiting this trial. He’s still not 100% guaranteed to lose. But at this point he’s almost trying to lose.