Was writer E. Jean Carroll the only person to file a lawsuit under New York's Adult Survivors Act? No, that's not true: There were thousands of lawsuits filed under the law, which allowed adult sexual assault survivors to sue in civil courts no matter how long ago the alleged incident occurred. There is no evidence that the bill was drafted and signed "just so E. Jean Carroll could sue Trump during an election year."
The claim appeared in a video (archived here) on TikTok on January 28, 2024. The person in the video began by saying:
Don't you think it's a little fucked up that the Democrats created a temporary law, just so E. Jean Carroll could sue Trump during an election year? Because that's what happened. Because the alleged incident that E. Jean Carroll sued Trump for was way outside the statute of limitations. Like, nobody else in the history of this country has ever been allowed to sue somebody for SA [sexual assault] they claimed happened 30 years ago.
This is what the video looked like on TikTok at the time of writing:
(Source: TikTok screenshot taken on Thu Feb 1 19:29:10 2024 UTC)
The person in the video was referring to the Adult Survivors Act (archived here). This legislation, enacted in New York state, allowed people to file civil lawsuits regarding sexual offense cases that happened when they were 18 years old or older and beyond the time specified in the state's civil statute of limitations. The bill was signed by New York Gov. Kathy Hochul on May 24, 2022 (archived here), with the lookback window beginning on November 24, 2022, and ending one year later. The Adult Survivors Act was fashioned much like the state's Child Victims Act (archived here), which allowed people to file civil lawsuits regarding sexual offense cases that happened when they were younger than 18 years old and beyond the time specified in the state's civil statute of limitations.
However, Carroll -- the writer whose accusation against Trump was initially published in 2019 (archived here) for an assault that she said took place in the mid-1990s -- was far from the only person to sue for sexual assault under the Adult Survivors Act. Several other high-profile figures were sued under the act, including three separate lawsuits against music mogul Sean "Diddy" Combs -- two of which accused him of sexual assault incidents that allegedly occurred in the early 1990s (archived here) -- and New York Mayor Eric Adams, for an incident that allegedly occurred in 1993 (archived here). Under the law, more than 3,000 lawsuits were filed as of November 24, 2023 (archived here).
Carroll sued Trump twice for issues related to the sexual assault accusation (archived here). She first sued Trump in 2019 for defamation after he denied her sexual assault claim. Then, under the Adult Survivors Act, she sued Trump again, claiming additional defamation and using the act's lookback window to seek damages for the sexual assault itself.
Other fact checks related to Trump can be found here.
