How much does it cost to keep Trump quiet?

How much money must E. Jean Carroll win to stop Donald Trump from talking about her?

A Manhattan jury last month ordered the former president to pay $3 million in damages for defaming Carroll when he said her accusation that he had raped her decades earlier was a lie. The next day, Trump appeared on CNN, and again accused Carroll of making up her story and for good measure called her a “wack job.”

Now, Carroll is seeking millions of dollars more to stop the river of invective.

Forbes magazine says Trump is worth $2.5 billion, but his actual wealth is in much dispute — he has said his net worth fluctuates with his mood. As he seeks the presidency again, he has used his legal troubles, which include state and federal indictments, to raise money by tearing into prosecutors and plaintiffs.

Trump became a celebrity and then the nation’s chief executive largely through the power of an untrammeled tongue, creating fascination even among opponents with his unpredictable and cruel verbal assaults. He is also famous for his love of money, bragging about his fortune and flaunting its gilded prizes.

Carroll and her lawyers are trying to win a jury award that would bring his competing desires into economic equilibrium. But is there any amount of money that could persuade the former president to keep her name out of his mouth?

Carroll’s complaint will be heard as part of a trial scheduled for January, stemming from verbal assaults he made against her in 2019. Carroll has said she lost her job as an advice columnist for Elle magazine after those attacks and is seeking at least $10 million in compensatory damages for harm to her reputation. After Trump’s recent CNN diatribe, she said she also wanted “a very substantial punitive damages award” that would “deter him from engaging in further defamation.”

Carroll’s lawyer, Roberta A. Kaplan, said it was hard to put a number on that deterrence without knowing more about Trump’s financial position.

“What I do know is that Donald Trump cares a lot about money,” Kaplan said. “And here, the prospect that he could have to pay millions of dollars in punitive damages each time he defames E. Jean Carroll again has to weigh on his mind.”