Donald Trump has asked a judge to hold up more than $5 million that he owes to E. Jean Carroll from a 2023 verdict against him. Trump says a court petition he filed should pause the payment The Guardian.

Here's how the money got there. Carroll won her lawsuit in 2023, and a jury said Trump had to pay her. Six weeks later, Trump put that jury award, plus 11 percent interest, into a special court account. Think of it like an escrow account: a neutral holding place while his legal appeals continued. Right now that account holds about $5.8 million The Guardian.

On June 29, 2026, the Supreme Court said it would not hear Trump's appeal. According to an agreement the two sides made in 2023, this decision meant Carroll could ask for her money. She filed that request on June 30—the very next day The Guardian. Her lawyer, Roberta Kaplan, said their 2023 agreement clearly spelled out that the funds would be released once the Supreme Court ruled The Guardian.

Then Trump made a countermove. On July 6, 2026, his lawyers filed a petition asking the Supreme Court to reconsider its decision. This is a rare legal step that almost never works. They told the judge that releasing the money while that petition is pending would hurt Trump The Guardian. They also said Carroll's side was wrong about what the 2023 agreement means—that it does not allow payment while the rehearing petition is still alive The Guardian.

But Trump has already lost several of these delay requests. One judge refused to let Trump delay his response to Carroll's payment demand USA Today. By July 6, 2026, another bid to stall had been rejected too Yahoo News.

The case itself is settled law. The verdict was final, lower courts upheld it, and now the Supreme Court has said no to Trump's appeal. What Trump is fighting about now is not whether he owes Carroll the money. It is about how to read their 2023 agreement—does it say he has to pay now, or can he wait because he filed this new petition?

The original lawsuit was filed in November 2022. The trial judgment came in May 2023 CourtListener. The case is called "Carroll II" because there was an earlier defamation case between them CourtListener. Even after the trial ended, the fighting over the escrow account has continued, with the latest court filing on July 4, 2026 CourtListener.

The judge, Lewis Kaplan, now has to decide what the 2023 agreement really means. The question boils down to this: did the agreement say payment could be held up if Trump filed a rehearing petition? Back in 2023, when they wrote the agreement, neither side knew a rehearing petition would ever happen. The way the judge reads those old words will decide whether Carroll gets her money soon or has to wait longer.