Judge Threatens Trump’s Lawyer Alina Habba With ‘Time In The Lockup’ In E. Jean Carroll Trial

Alina Habba

Work as Trump attorney

2021

In 2019, Habba joined the Trump National Golf Club Bedminster in New Jersey, an eight-minute drive from her law firm. There, she and Donald Trump got acquainted. In a lawsuit filed in December 2023 aimed at referring Habba to the New Jersey Office of Attorney Ethics, a Trump National Golf Club Bedminster employee alleged that in the second half of 2021, Habba induced the employee into entering an illegal non-disclosure agreement when the employee intended to accuse a club manager of workplace sexual misconduct (New Jersey banned non-disclosure agreements for workplace harassment). The employee alleges that Habba tried to befriend her, encouraged the firing of the employee's lawyer, provided the non-disclosure agreement with penalties for disclosure, and warned the employee not to publicize the workplace sexual misconduct accusation; Habba responded in 2023: "I always conduct myself ethically and acted no differently in this circumstance.".

 

Habba had never done legal work for Trump when, in September 2021, he hired her as part of his legal team, replacing several well-established lawyers who had worked for Trump for many years but had withdrawn their services, including: Marc Kasowitz, Charles Harder, Joanna Hendon, Marc Saroff Mukasey, Jay Sekulow, and Lawrence S. Rosen.

 

Quickly after her hiring, Habba filed a $100 million lawsuit on Trump's behalf against The New York Times, three Times reporters, and Trump's niece, Mary L. Trump. Her lawsuit was dismissed by the judge for "fail[ing] as a matter of constitutional law".

 

Habba also worked on Trump's behalf when he was sued for defamation by Summer Zervos. Trump had called Zervos a "liar" in 2017, after she accused him of kissing her and groping her, without her consent, when she was a contestant on Trump's reality TV show, The Apprentice. In October 2021, Habba filed a Trump countersuit against Zervos, claiming she was trying to stifle Trump's right to free speech. Shortly thereafter, in November 2021, Zervos discontinued the lawsuit.

 

2022–present

Habba represented Trump in a legal case where he was being investigated for falsely representing the value of his assets on various Statements of Net Worth that banks required him to file annually to ensure that Trump had sufficient funds to repay their loans.[32] She unsuccessfully appealed a court order requiring Trump and his children to give sworn testimony about the valuations they signed for when filing those returns. New York's Attorney General, Letitia James, personally questioned Trump on August 10, 2022. Habba was present during the deposition and led the defense. Trump refused to answer any questions during the four-hour deposition by pleading the United States Constitution's Fifth Amendment over 450 times.

 

In February 2022, Habba unsuccessfully attempted to prevent Trump from being required to give a sworn statement in an investigation led by New York Attorney General James.

 

On July 19, 2022, Habba was sued by a former employee Na'Syia Drayton who claimed Habba repeatedly sang inappropriate gangster rap and hip hop music in the office while using the N word, made racist comments, and referred to New York's attorney general Letitia James as '"that Black bitch." The lawsuit was settled out of court in September 2022. Habba had called James a "sick person" in January of the same year.

 

In September 2022, U.S. District Court Judge Donald M. Middlebrooks dismissed a 2022 suit brought by Habba for Trump against Hillary Clinton, John Podesta, Jake Sullivan, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, and numerous other public officials, private citizens, and private entities that Trump sought damages against for alleged conduct surrounding the 2016 presidential election. Dismissing all of Trump's claims, Middlebrooks concluded that Trump's complaint was not just inadequate in any respect, but rather was inadequate in all respects, and expressly reserved the right to consider sanctions against Trump's attorneys at a later date.

 

Two months after issuing that decision, Middlebrooks sanctioned the Trump lawyers, including Habba, Michael T. Madaio, Peter Ticktin, and Jamie Alan Sasson. They were assessed $50,000 penalties, plus $16,000 to cover the legal fees paid by one of the defendants. Later in January 2023, Middlebrooks ordered Trump, Habba, and her firm to pay $938,000 in legal costs for 31 defendants, including the Democratic National Committee, Hillary Clinton, and former FBI director James Comey. The judge wrote about the lawsuit brought by Habba: "No reasonable lawyer would have filed it. Intended for a political purpose, none of the counts of the amended complaint stated a cognizable legal claim." In February 2023, the Order was pending appeal before the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit. Speaking at a December 2023 Turning Point USA conference, Habba asserted no one had heard of the case, falsely alleging the "fake news" had not reported it. She added that "me and President Trump got sanctioned a million dollars for going against Crooked Hillary" and "there were probably 50 lawyers representing all of the radical left," though the suit had named 31 defendants.

 

Habba represented Trump in a federal civil lawsuit filed by his former attorney, Michael Cohen. Cohen had been released from prison into home confinement during the Coronavirus pandemic. He was re-imprisoned after promoting his book criticizing Trump and released again 16 days later after obtaining an injunction. Cohen later sued Trump and former Justice Department employees for damages. Habba filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit with prejudice, and the lower court ruled against Cohen. In January 2024, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit upheld the lower court's decision.

 

Habba defended Trump's private interests in the Carroll v. Trump case, when she argued before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit that the Federal Tort Claims Act applies to a former U.S. president. The Second Circuit, in a decision dated September 27, 2022, agreed that Trump was an employee of the United States at the time and that the District Court must consider the applicability of the Federal Tort Claims Act to Trump's comments in that light.The Second Circuit decision did not address the merits of Trump's claim that the comments constituted executive action as the President of the United States. In December 2023, the appeals court upheld the federal judge's ruling rejecting Trump's claim of presidential immunity.

 

In 2022, Trump's Save America political action committee paid Habba's firm almost $2 million in legal fees.

 

In January 2024, Habba predicted that Associate Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, "who the president fought for, who the president went through hell to get into place", would "step up" to support Trump's case in Trump v. Anderson, which will decide whether Trump is disqualified from ballot access per the Fourteenth Amendment. Habba disclaimed that justices like Kavanaugh would rule for Trump because "they're pro-law, because they’re pro-fairness", instead of being "pro-Trump".

 

Habba served as lead attorney for the E. Jean Carroll v. Donald J. Trump trial that began on January 16, 2024. Over the course of three days, presiding federal judge Lewis Kaplan repeatedly reprimanded Habba for her methods of cross-examining Carroll and introducing evidence. A jury awarded Carroll $83.3 million in damages against Trump on January 26, 2024.