Who is E. Jean Carroll? The journalist is known for her famed advice column and magazine profiles, and so she used her writing abilities to detail shocking allegations of sexual assault against Donald Trump in her upcoming book.
E. Jean Carroll, 75, posed on the cover of New York Magazine for its June 24-July 7 issue, accompanied by a bold statement: “This is what I was wearing 23 years ago when Donald Trump attacked me in a Bergdorf Goodman dressing room.” Pulling an excerpt from her upcoming book, What Do We Need Men For? A Modest Proposal, the magazine published Carroll’s account of her run-in with the POTUS at a Bergdorf Goodman store that allegedly ended in sexual assault more than two decades ago. Carroll claimed that Trump needed help picking out lingerie as a present, which eventually led the real estate tycoon to suggest that the writer try on a lace bodysuit. Carroll joked that Trump should try on the piece instead, and they later entered a dressing room together.
The story took a sharp turn once inside the dressing room, as the columnist accused Trump of shoving her against a wall, pulling down her tights and “forcing his fingers around my private area, thrusts his penis halfway — or completely, I’m not certain — inside me.” While a senior White House official denied these allegations, blaming the story on an attempt “to make the President look bad,” the excerpt is penned in a way only a decorated writer could. Here’s what you should know about the columnist who waited over 20 years to tell her side of the story.
1. Carroll is renown for her “Ask E. Jean” column in Elle. The magazine has run the column since 1993! The successful column paved the way to a television show, Ask E, which aired between 1994 and 1996.
2. Carroll is an accomplished journalist. She boasts many bylines in publications like Playboy, Esquire, and Outside — and Carroll still found time to author five books. In addition to her upcoming book (to be released on July 2), Carroll wrote the following works: Female Difficulties: Sorority Sisters, Rodeo Queens, Frigid Women, Smut Stars, and Other Modern Girls, A Dog in Heat Is a Hot Dog and Other Rules to Live By, Hunter: The Strange and Savage Life of Hunter S. Thompson and Mr. Right, Right Now.
3. She wrote for Saturday Night Live. Carroll joined the late night comedic sketch show’s writing team between 1986 and 1987.
4. Carroll accused former CBS chief Les Moonves of sexual assault as well. Carroll accused Moonves (who was the president of CBS Entertainment at the time) of attempting to grope her in an elevator, after she interviewed him for an Esquire profile in the late ’90s. Moonves “emphatically” denied this.
5. She was crowned Miss Cheerleader USA in 1964. Carroll was a cheerleader at Indiana University, and represented her school while competing for the prestigious title.