Marlow: Investigation Season—Time for DOJ to Investigate Lewis Kaplan, the Judge Who Threatened to Jail Alina Habba

Over the past year, I have investigated all of the six major cases against Donald Trump that played out simultaneously between his two administrations for my book Breaking the Law. Each one of them involves obvious improprieties that necessitate investigations. In many instances, I believe investigators will find criminal activity, which ought to be prosecuted.

It is encouraging and heartening to see that the Department of Justice has taken up a criminal investigation into New York Attorney General Letitia “Tish” James and that the Office of the Special Counsel is investigating Special Counsel Jack Smith. This could mark a new era of accountability in this country and a return to law and order.

Last week, I offered a list of people who ought to get investigated by the DOJ. After reflecting on the list for a few days, I have concluded that the next person who ought to face deep scrutiny is Judge Lewis A. Kaplan, who presided over the farcical E. Jean Carroll defamation cases against Trump.

Carroll spun what appears to be an absurd web about having sex Trump (or was she raped? She couldn’t decide) at Bergdorf Goodman, a New York City Department store, and then claimed that Trump had defamed her when he emphatically denied he claims.

The goal was to affix the “rapist” label to Trump’s brand, despite the fact that Trump was a New York playboy for most of his life and had never been characterized as such.

Then they would try to injure him financially with an egregious penalty.

Trump told me Kaplan was the meanest judge he encountered during the series of trials I describe in Breaking the Law, with Juan Merchan a close second.

“He’s Bill Clinton’s best friend,” the president said of Kaplan.

The details of Carroll’s claims against Trump are ridiculous on paper. A full (dare I say, entertaining) accounting of her case can be found in Breaking the Law, but here are a few of the key details:

The idea to pursue Trump over this alleged encounter came from George Conway, the legal pundit who has made a career attacking Trump (and embarrassing his now ex-wife, Kellyanne).
Carroll’s legal team was funded by billionaire Democrat megadonor Reid Hoffman.
Carroll could not remember the year the alleged attack took place.
There were no witnesses, and she did not scream.
She claims to have saved the dress she wore that day, unwashed, yet she would not turn it over as evidence.
She did not come forward with her story until she was selling a book. That means she sat silent during #MeToo.
Her version of the events that day are almost identical to a plot of an episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
Carroll says she is fan of Law & Order — but not a fan of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.
She was also a fan of The Apprentice.
She had written a column a couple years prior to the alleged attack that referenced sex at Bergdorf’s.
She said on CNN that “I think most people think of rape as being sexy.”

The list goes on, and on, and on. There are many more details documented in the book, each seemingly more absurd than the next.

Still, the case went on, and ended up being the purest example of lawfare against President Trump that I encountered.

The reason why things got out of hand was because of Judge Lewis A. Kaplan. Here are a few of the reasons he should be investigated:

Blocking Evidence That Could Hurt Carroll

Judge Lewis Kaplan would not allow for the aforementioned dress to be admitted as evidence. This would be a recurring theme of the trial. “The dress was great,” Trump told me in an interview in 2025. “The dress was a Monica Lewinsky–type dress. Then when they found out there was nothing on the dress, so we wanted the dress, and the judge said ‘nope.’ We’re not gonna let you show it.”

Trump also attempted to bring evidence to suggest that Carroll might be crazy. He wanted to cite to the jury that she had a cat named “Vagina.” He also wanted to alert the jury to the CNN interview where she said most people think of rape “as being sexy.” In the same interview, Kaplan wouldn’t allow it.

Allowing Dubious Character Evidence Against Trump

In an act of overt partisanship, Judge Kaplan did allow character evidence to be used against Trump, including the infamous Access Hollywood tape. The plaintiff ’s team used Trump’s locker-room talk to try to prove that he committed the alleged rape. This defies logic and would have been legally inadmissible in a criminal case, but the judge allowed it here.

Exerting Excessive Control over the Court

Trump attorney Alina Habba told me that while the Trump team was considering putting the former president on the witness stand, “the judge made me tell him every single question that I was going to ask and what answers [Trump] was going to give me.”

“I went ballistic,” she told me. “I wouldn’t relent.”

“You are not allowing me to represent my client. This is so insane,” she told me in an exclusive interview, reenacting the drama. “I can’t put in evidence that proves everything this woman says is a lie.”

Threatening to Throw Trump’s Attorney into a Dungeon-Like Prison

Kaplan didn’t take kindly to Habba’s lawyering. “You say one more thing, and I’m going to throw you in jail,” the judge threatened, according to Habba.

Trump corroborated her account to me, even suggesting the judge threatened to put her into cells underneath the courthouse that are seldom used.

He Was Obviously a Fan of Carroll’s

He wrote that the jury was “entitled to conclude that Mr. Trump derailed the career, reputation, and emotional well-being of one of America’s most successful and prominent advice columnists and authors.”

Unfairly—and Politically—Attacking Trump

There was one particularly egregious example of Judge Kaplan’s anti-Trump prejudice. At one point, he released a “clarification” saying that Trump may be said to have “raped” Carroll, even though the jury specifically did not say he had done so. “The finding that Ms. Carroll failed to prove that she was ‘raped’ within the meaning of the New York Penal Law does not mean that she failed to prove that Mr. Trump ‘raped’ her as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape,’” Kaplan wrote. “Indeed, as the evidence at trial recounted below makes clear, the jury found that Mr. Trump in fact did exactly that,” according to the judge.

He went out of his way to redefine “rape” so it applied to Trump, even though the jury had not done so.

Judge Kaplan campaigned against Trump in his courtroom and in the court of public opinion, citing “evidence that Mr. Trump used the office of the presidency—the loudest ‘bully pulpit’ in America and possibly the world—to issue multiple statements castigating Ms. Carroll as a politically and financially motivated liar, insinuating that she was too unattractive for him to have sexually assaulted, and threatening that she would ‘pay dearly’ for speaking out.”

Usurping the Power of the Jury

Judge Kapan ruled that Trump was civilly liable for defamation. Typically, a jury would make that determination at a trial, but Kaplan did it himself.

Allowing for a Cruel and Unusual Punishment

There were actually two Carroll trials (this timeline is made clear in Breaking the Law), with Trump ultimately having to secure a $91 million bond to cover penalty plus interest. Carroll had only asked for a combined $15 million, so the $91 million numbers is obviously excessive. Yet Kaplan let it stand.

This is how lawfare works. If you can’t get your target with the laws on the books, make a new one. And if you can’t convict in a criminal court, get a civil judgment with obscene damages.

Just because it works this way doesn’t mean we have to accept it.

Judge Lewis A. Kaplan did his best to ensure Donald Trump was branded with a scarlet “r” for “rapist” – even though he clearly wasn’t one – ahead of his presidential election. He also saw to it that Trump was fined in an excessively punitive way.

All of this is worse than playing politics from the bench.

It is attempted election interference.

And he ought to be investigated.

This article was adapted from portions of Breaking the Law.

Breaking the Law: Exposing the Weaponization of America’s Legal System Against Donald Trump, which has been hailed by President Trump as a “must read” book, is available in hardcover, eReader format, and as an audiobook read by the author himself.

Alex Marlow is the editor-in-chief of Breitbart News, a two-time New York Times bestselling author, and the host of “The Alex Marlow Show” podcast produced weekdays by Breitbart News and Salem Podcast Network. You can subscribe to the podcast on YouTube, Rumble, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify. You can follow Alex on Facebook, Instagram, and X at @AlexMarlow.