Despite Apology, Trump Insists On Suing BBC

President Donald Trump has maintained that he will proceed with a lawsuit against the BBC next week over a misleading edit of his January 6, 2021 speech on its investigative documentary series called Panorama.

This is despite the broadcaster’s apology.

Speaking to journalists aboard Air Force One on Friday night, Trump said the suit would seek damages “anywhere between a billion and $5 billion” and would be filed “probably sometime next week.”

The BBC had acknowledged that its editing of the speech may have wrongly suggested Trump directly called for violent action, and issued an apology in its ‘Corrections and Clarifications’ section. However, it rejected demands for financial compensation.

Trump disclosed that he plans to raise the matter with UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer over the weekend.

Earlier in the week, Trump’s legal team had issued a formal threat to sue the BBC for $1bn unless it retracted the clip, apologised, and paid damages, giving a deadline of 22:00 GMT on Friday. The broadcaster responded within the timeframe.

According to BBC, searches of public court records show no lawsuit has yet been filed, and courts in Florida, where such a case would likely be heard, are currently closed until Monday.

The controversy has already triggered the resignation of BBC Director General Tim Davie and head of news Deborah Turness.

Speaking in an interview on GB News aired Saturday and recorded before his confirmation of legal action, Trump described the edit as unprecedented

“I’ve never seen anything like that. That’s the most egregious. I think that was worse than the Kamala thing with CBS and 60 Minutes,” he said.

Trump referenced a July settlement in which Paramount Global agreed to pay $16m to resolve a dispute regarding a CBS interview with former Vice-President Kamala Harris.

“I think I have an obligation to do it. If you don’t do it, you don’t stop it from happening again,” Trump said.

The BBC apology came after the disclosure of a second similarly edited clip aired on Newsnight in 2022. The broadcaster reiterated that the edit was not intended to mislead and argued there was no legal basis for a defamation claim.

In a letter to Trump’s lawyers, the BBC outlined several reasons it believes the claim cannot stand, including that the Panorama episode was only broadcast in the UK, that Trump suffered no harm, as he was re-elected shortly afterward, and that the clip formed a small part of an hour-long programme featuring multiple pro-Trump voices.

It also argued that political speech enjoys strong legal protections in US defamation law.

A BBC spokesperson confirmed that Chair Samir Shah had written personally to the White House expressing regret over the edit, but emphasized that the broadcaster would not provide financial compensation.

“While the BBC sincerely regrets the manner in which the video clip was edited, we strongly disagree there is a basis for a defamation claim,” the spokesperson said.