Donald Trump has taken a seat in court, where jury selection in his defamation trial is scheduled to get underway this morning.

His decision to attend this trial is a clear shift for the former president, whose lawyers portrayed his absence from last year's defamation and battery trial as a service to New York City, saying the city would not have to suffer the "logistical and financial burdens" of Trump's attendance.

Carroll's attorneys, however, pounced on Trump's absence.

"He didn't even bother to show up here in person," attorney Roberta Kaplan told the jury.

Writing on social media last month, Trump blamed his absence at the trial on "not good advice" from his then-lawyer Joe Tacopina.

"I was asked by my lawyer not to attend--'It was beneath me, and they have no case.' That was not good advice," Trump wrote.

Trump attorney Alina Habba is serving as Trump's lead defense attorney for this week's trial.

E. Jean Carroll has arrived at the courthouse for the first day of the trial.

The former Elle magazine columnist smiled to reporters as she entered court.

Following his victory in Iowa, former President Trump landed at 3:30 a.m. in New York and just arrived at his civil defamation trial in lower Manhattan.

Trump is not required to attend the trial, though his decision not to attend last year's defamation and battery trial by the same plaintiff, writer E. Jean Carroll, was mocked by Carroll's attorney.

Trump's motorcade pulled up to the courthouse this morning at at 8:50 a.m. ET.

When Donald Trump's federal defamation trial gets underway in lower Manhattan this morning, it will be only about 11 hours since the former president claimed victory in the Iowa caucuses.

The trial is expected to take about a week, which could take Trump right to the doorstep of the New Hampshire Primary, scheduled for next Tuesday.

The former president did not attend last year's trial, held at the same courthouse, where a New York jury found him liable for sexually assaulting E. Jean Carroll and defaming her when he denied her accusation in a 2022 social media post.

After walking out of the courtroom, former President Trump remained absent for the remainder of the plaintiff's closing statement, during which E. Jean Carroll's attorney Roberta Kaplan asked the jury to punish Trump for the "humiliation and mental anguish" he inflicted on Carroll.

"The evidence was as shocking as it was unmistakable," the attorney said. "Imagine for a second what it would feel like to go to sleep in one world and wake up in another world, one in which the president of the United States ... is attacking you.

Death threats followed death threats, which the lawyer said is what Trump wanted. "Donald Trump had said that Ms. Carroll should pay dearly and that Ms. Carroll had entered into dangerous territory," she told the jury.

She said the jury's compensatory damages award should include the cost to repair Carroll's reputation, which an expert testified could cost as much as $12 million.

"While Ms. Carroll built that career over five decades, Donald Trump shattered it in a matter of hours," she said. "People are not dying to write to an advice columnist who the president says is a disgrace."

The attorney also asked the jury to award punitive damages, arguing the defamation has not ceased, even after an earlier trial last May held him liable for sexual assault and defamation and awarded Carroll $5 million in damages.

She declined to name a dollar figure for the award, but said it should be at least as much as the $12 million repair campaign plus additional compensatory and punitive damages.

She urged the jury to consider one question: "How much will it take to make him stop?"

"You actually have the opportunity, maybe even a responsibility, to put an end to this by requiring Donald Trump to pay an amount of money large enough for him that it will finally make him stop," she said.