Has Donald Trump ever been criminally convicted of assaulting a woman?

1. The difference that matters: civil liability versus criminal conviction

In 2023 a Manhattan jury found Trump liable in civil court for sexually abusing E. Jean Carroll and for defamation, awarding Carroll damages; civil liability rests on a preponderance of the evidence and does not equate to a criminal guilty verdict, which would require proof beyond a reasonable doubt and result in a criminal conviction and sentence — multiple outlets explained this distinction and warned against conflating the two ^{[2] [4] [3]}.

2. What the civil verdict established and what it did not

The jury determined Trump committed sexual abuse (battery) against Carroll and defamed her when he denied the allegation, but jurors explicitly declined to find he committed rape, and courts and legal commentators emphasized that the verdict established civil liability, not criminal guilt or a criminal conviction under penal law ^{[5] [4] [3]}.

3. The larger pattern of accusations and how reporting frames them

Reporting compiled over years documents that more than two dozen women have publicly accused Trump of behavior ranging from groping to rape dating from the 1980s through the 2000s; outlets including Cosmopolitan and Wikipedia summarize those allegations while noting Trump’s repeated denials and political responses from his family and allies, which situates the allegations in both legal and political contexts ^{[1] [6]}.

4. Legal maneuvering, appeals and evidentiary fights

Trump has appealed civil judgments and contested evidentiary rulings, including challenges over admitting testimony from other accusers and a recording in the Carroll litigation; appellate rulings discussed the admissibility of prior-act evidence under federal rules and rejected reversible error in the Carroll appeals ^{[7] [8]}.

5. What the fact‑checks and legal experts say

Fact-checking coverage and legal scholars cited in reporting underscore that the Carroll judgment is civil, not criminal: Newsweek quoted experts warning that labeling the civil verdict as a criminal conviction would be “legally wrong and dangerous,” and scholars stressed that a civil finding does not answer whether criminal prosecutors could have met the higher standard for conviction ^[3].

6. Alternative viewpoints, political framing and limitations of the public record

Supporters and some family members have described allegations as politically motivated “dirty tricks,” and reporting shows partisan framing in coverage and public statements; meanwhile, available sources do not document any criminal prosecution resulting in a conviction for Trump for assaulting a woman, and the record in these sources is limited to civil findings, allegations, political responses and other non-sexual criminal cases referenced elsewhere ^{[6] [9] [2]}. If any criminal convictions for assault exist beyond the cited materials, they are not reflected in the provided reporting.