Donald Trump: The former US president is being questioned in a defamation lawsuit brought by a writer who accuses him of raping her

Former US President Donald Trump was questioned under oath Wednesday in a lawsuit brought against him by a newspaper writer who said he raped her.

E. Jean Carroll alleges that the attack took place in the room of a luxury clothing store in New York in the mid-1990s.

Trump denied the allegations and said Carroll was lying, prompting her to file a defamation lawsuit.

Carroll's lawyer did not disclose details of the interrogation, but said it took place on Wednesday.

"On behalf of our client, EJane Carroll, we are pleased to report that we were able to cross-examine and obtain statements from Donald Trump today," a spokesperson for the law firm Kaplan Hecker & Fink said.

"But we cannot comment further than that," he added.

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"As we've said all along, my client was happy to set the record straight today," Trump's attorney, Alina Heba, said in a statement.

"This case is nothing more than a political ploy, like many others in the long list of witch-hunts against Donald Trump," she added.

In a 2019 article for New York magazine, Carroll — a longtime Elle advice columnist — said she had the chance to meet Trump in late 1995 or early 1996 at Bergdorf Goodman.

She added that she was helping him choose a gift and they ended up in the dressing room, where she claims he raped her. And she added that she was 52 years old at the time, and Trump was about 50 years old, and he was then married to Marla Maples.

At the time, Carroll also said she told two friends about the incident. One of them advised her to go to the police, but the other warned her not to talk, saying, "Forget it! He has 200 lawyers. He will bury you."

Trump quickly dismissed the claim, accusing Carroll of lying to sell her book.

When he was president of the United States, she sued him for defamation, saying his comments had damaged her reputation.

Trump's lawyers tried to delay the questioning, but Judge Louis A. Kaplan of Federal District Court in Manhattan denied the request last week.