United States network ABC News has agreed to pay President-elect Donald Trump US$15 million (A$23 million) to settle a defamation lawsuit.
Trump filed for the lawsuit after Anchor George Stephanopoulos claimed Trump had been “liable for rape” of writer E Jean Carroll during an interview with South Carolina representative Nancy Mace, resulting in two lawsuits against him.
According to documents filed on Saturday, the network and the anchor have agreed to offer a live public apology for the comments during a live This Week interview with Representative Nancy Mace.
Trump had been found liable for sexual abuse of Carroll in 2023, which is a different transgression than rape under New York Law.
In the first lawsuit, Trump was found liable for sexual assault and defaming Carroll, resulting in the jury ordering him to pay her $5 million.
In January he was found liable for additional defamation charges and ordered to pay Carroll $83.3 million.
Trump is appealing both cases.
Lewis Kaplan, the judge in both cases said the jury’s conclusion was that Carroll had failed to prove that Trump raped her "within the narrow, technical meaning of a particular section of the New York Penal Law".
The judge said the verdict did not mean that Carroll “failed to prove that Mr. Trump ‘raped’ her as many people commonly understand the word ‘rape’. Indeed … the jury found that Mr. Trump in fact did exactly that."
ABC News will be required to make a $15 million donation to a fund desiccated to “a presidential foundation and museum for Trump and pay as part of the terms of settlement and also pay an additional $1 million in lawyer fees.