"There's no basis to grant a mistrial merely because Trump disagrees with Judge Kaplan's evidentiary rulings."
U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan on Monday denied Donald Trump's attorney's request for a mistrial in E. Jean Carroll's civil case accusing the former president of rape and defamation. Trump attorney Joe Tacopina filed a letter in Manhattan federal court on Monday morning, arguing that a mistrial should be granted "based upon pervasive unfair and prejudicial rulings by the Court." Tacopina accused Kaplan of being biased against Trump. "Here, despite the fact trial testimony has been underway for only two days, the proceedings are already replete with numerous examples of Defendant's unfair treatment by the Court, most of which has been witnessed by the Jury," the letter said. Carroll, who sued the former president for battery and defamation, alleges that Trump damaged her reputation by calling her a liar and repeatedly denying her accusations that he raped her in a Bergdorf Goodman department store dressing room in either 1995 or 1996. "The judge has done nothing more than manage the trial, as all judges do," former U.S. Attorney Barb McQuade, a law professor at the University of Michigan, told Salon. "Judges must decide whether to sustain or overrule objections and often tell lawyers to move along with repetitive questioning. This motion is necessary to preserve any issues for appeal." So far, Tacopina has questioned the validity of Carroll's claims while…