Trump trial live updates: Closing arguments to begin in E Jean Carroll defamation case

E Jean Carroll’s lawyer Roberta Kaplan had only just begun presenting the closing argument for her client when Donald Trump rose and walked out of the courtroom.

Kaplan said the former president’s testimony yesterday was brief because he doesn’t get a do-over and reminded the jury that this is all about how to compensate Ms Carroll for Mr Trump’s statements and how to punish him for making them.

She continued by saying that the trial is about getting him to stop such behaviour once and for all and to demonstrate that the rules apply to all, including him.

Kaplan asked the jury to think of his attitude to this proceeding, recounting how he defamed Ms Carroll and then his claim he had no choice but to do so.

“Donald Trump has tried to normalise this conduct. Normally, when people lose in court, they change their behaviour,” she said, adding that he didn’t respect the previous trial’s jury decision for even 24 hours.

At this moment the former president stood up and left the room.

Judge Lewis Kaplan interrupted Ms Carroll’s lawyer to say: “The record will reflect that Mr. Trump just rose and walked out of the courtroom.”

He then admonished the defence, telling them again that they must remain seated.

Judge Kaplan specifically said that includes Boris Epshteyn, who walked out with Mr Trump and then returned to the courtroom without him.

Late show host Seth Meyers has revealed what being in the “MAGA camp” really entails after Donald Trump warned Nikki Haley donors they would be “permanently barred” from it if they continue to contribute to her campaign.

“We don’t want them and will not accept them because we Put America First, and ALWAYS WILL!” he added.

On Late Night with Seth Meyers on Thursday, Mr Meyers explained that the “MAGA camp” is somewhat different to your average Boy Scout excursion.

Donald Trump and his defence team were late getting into the courtroom for closing arguments this morning with Judge Lewis Kaplan reminding them that during the presentation of arguments and the instructions to the jury, no one else is to speak.

In a brief back-and-forth over the submission of evidence, Judge Kaplan also told Mr Trump’s lawyer Alina Habba that she was “on the verge of spending some time in the lockup”.

Closing arguments are to begin Friday in the defamation case against Donald Trump a day after the former president left a New York courtroom fuming that he hadn’t been given an opportunity to refute E. Jean Carroll’s sexual abuse accusations.

Lawyers will get to sum up their cases for nine jurors who will start deliberating later in the day whether Carroll, a former advice columnist, is entitled to more than the $5 million she was awarded in a separate trial last year.

The final remarks from the lawyers come a day after Trump managed to sneak past a federal judge’s rules severely limiting what he could say during his turn on the witness stand, which wound up lasting just 3 minutes.

“She said something that I considered to be a false accusation,” Trump said, later adding: “I just wanted to defend myself, my family and, frankly, the presidency.” The jury was told by Judge Lewis A. Kaplan to disregard both remarks.

As we saw earlier, the Republican National Committee swiftly walked back its move to coronate Donald Trump early after the candidate himself rejected it.

But Nikki Haley’s camp was also incensed by the aborted resolution.

“Who cares what the RNC says? We’ll let millions of Republican voters across the country decide who should be our party’s nominee, not a bunch of Washington insiders,” her campaign spokeswoman Olivia Perez-Cubas told Fox News.

“If Ronna McDaniel wants to be helpful she can organise a debate in South Carolina, unless she’s also worried that Trump can’t handle being on the stage for 90 minutes with Nikki Haley.”

RNC spokesperson Keith Schipper attempted to cool the situation by saying in a statement of his own: “Resolutions, such as this one, are brought forward by members of the RNC. Chairwoman McDaniel doesn’t offer resolutions.

“This will be taken up by the Resolutions Committee, and they will decide whether to send this resolution to be voted on by the 168 RNC members at our annual meeting next week.”

The last Republican challenger left standing has been pivoting since New Hampshire towards pitching herself as a Tea Party original in an explicit appeal to Trump’s hard-right base, suggesting she was doing conservative populism long before MAGA was a twinkle in her rival’s eye.

She is also working hard to suggest, improbably, that is she the true “anti-establishment” candidate and implies Trump is now part of the very same “DC swamp” he once promised to drain.

She further argues that Democrats WANT Trump to win because they can believe Biden can beat him, but not her.

AND she’s already selling T-shirts capitalising on his threat yesterday to excommunicate her donors from his movement, serving Trump a dose of his own medicine.

Where has this fighting spirit been for the last calendar year??

A federal judge in Washington DC has sentenced former Trump White House aide Peter Navarro to four months in jail and fined him $9,500 for wilfully defying a subpoena issued by the House January 6 select committee in 2021.

Navarro is the second ex-Trump administration aide to receive a custodial sentence after being convicted of contempt of Congress.

His onetime White House chief strategist, Steve Bannon, was sentenced to four months in jail last year but is appealing his sentence.

Andrew Feinberg filed this report from Washington, DC.

Andrew Feinberg has been speaking to veteran GOP consultants about what they have made of the Republican presidential contest so far.

This is what they had to say.