Washington (Parliament Politics Magazine) – US President Donald Trump files up to $10bn lawsuit against BBC over Panorama edit of his January 6 speech, despite broadcaster’s formal apology for the error.
As reported by Callum Jones and Jeremy Barr of The Guardian, US President Donald Trump has initiated legal action against the BBC over its editing of a speech he delivered to supporters in Washington ahead of the 2021 Capitol riot, demanding up to $10bn in damages.
How Donald Trump is taking the BBC to court over edited January 6 speech?
President Trump claimed the BBC “intentionally, maliciously, and deceptively” altered his January 6 speech before the Capitol insurrection, in a Panorama episode aired just over a year ago.
In a complaint filed on Monday evening, 15 December, Mr. Trump lodged a lawsuit seeking $5 billion in damages for two counts, claiming the BBC defamed him and breached Florida’s Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act.
The BBC’s Panorama, merging sections of President Trump’s speech nearly an hour apart, suggested he told supporters,
“We’re going to walk down to the Capitol and I’ll be there with you, and we fight. We fight like hell.”
For years, Mr Trump has used legal threats and lawsuits to pressure media outlets critical of him, with his case against the BBC representing a global extension of this campaign.
The lawsuit was filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida, despite BBC iPlayer, which streams Panorama, and BBC One, which broadcasts it, neither of which is accessible in the United States.
According to a spokesperson for President Trump’s legal team, the edits to his speech, aired a week before the 2024 presidential election, represented a “brazen attempt” to interfere in the contest.
“The BBC has a long pattern of deceiving its audience in coverage of President Trump, all in service of its own leftist political agenda. President Trump’s powerhouse lawsuit is holding the BBC accountable for its defamation and reckless election interference just as he has held other fake news mainstream media responsible for their wrongdoing,”
the spokesperson added.
Mr Trump’s lawsuit argued that the Florida court has jurisdiction because the BBC engages in “substantial and not isolated business activities” in the state, referencing its website and BritBox, which operates in several countries, including the US.
Speaking to reporters at the Oval Office on Monday, President Trump teased his impending lawsuit, saying,
“In a little while, you’ll be seeing I’m suing the BBC for putting words in my mouth. Literally, they put words in my mouth. They had me saying things that I never said.”
In the lawsuit against the BBC, Mr Trump’s attorneys argue that
“The BBC, faced with overwhelming and justifiable outrage on both sides of the Atlantic, has publicly admitted its staggering breach of journalistic ethics, and apologized, but has made no showing of actual remorse for its wrongdoing nor meaningful institutional changes to prevent future journalistic abuses.”
They added,
“Accordingly, President Trump brings this action for compensatory and punitive damages for the extensive reputational harm inflicted upon him by the defendants.”
Following his re-election in November, President Trump has secured several notable legal wins against prominent American media outlets. ABC, owned by Disney, agreed to a $15m settlement over a defamation lawsuit stemming from remarks made by anchor George Stephanopoulos.
He also settled for $16m with Paramount in July, claiming the company, which owns CBS News, had falsely edited a pre-election interview with Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris.
Legal experts considered the case easily winnable for Paramount, but company leadership viewed it as a distraction, particularly as it sought government approval for a merger with Skydance Media.
The President has repeatedly rejected claims of involvement in the January 2021 attack on the Capitol, which aimed to prevent Congress from certifying former US President Joe Biden’s victory over him in the 2020 presidential election.
Since returning to the office earlier this year, President Trump issued pardons to hundreds involved in the January 6, 2021, attack, including those convicted of violent offenses.
What did press freedom campaigners say about Donald Trump’s $10bn BBC lawsuit?
Seth Stern, director of advocacy at the Freedom of the Press Foundation, said,
“You don’t get to call out any alleged journalistic blunder and demand $10bn. It’s preposterous for Trump to claim those damages when he won the 2024 election and hasn’t lost a penny because of the BBC’s editing.”
He added,
“It’s also absurd for him to claim associating him with January 6 is defamatory after he spent years insisting nothing bad happened that day and then pardoned those involved. And it’s similarly outrageous that his claims are based on supposedly damaging implications of his using the word ‘fight’. He sells T-shirts with that word on them.”
What did the BBC say about editing Donald Trump’s January 6 speech?
The BBC issued an official apology to President Trump in November, describing the incident as an “error of judgement” and confirming the programme “will not be broadcast again in this form on any BBC platforms.”
A spokesperson said,
“The BBC sincerely regrets the manner in which the video clip was edited,”
adding,
“We strongly disagree there is a basis for a defamation claim.”
How allegations over the BBC’s edited Donald Trump speech came to light?
The allegations were made by PR executive and former independent adviser to the BBC’s editorial guidelines and standards committee, Michael Prescott, in a memo sent to the broadcaster’s board that was later leaked to the Daily Telegraph.
The broadcaster has previously called the editing an “error of judgment” and apologized to President Trump, but rejected any legal claim of defamation.
The BBC’s director general, Tim Davie, and news chief Deborah Turness resigned last month amid the controversy. Their departures came during a crisis sparked by allegations of “serious and systemic problems” in coverage of Gaza, trans issues, and Donald Trump.
What happened during the Capitol riots?
The Capitol riots occurred on January 6, 2021, when a mob of supporters of President Donald Trump stormed the US Capitol Building in Washington, D.C. The attack was an attempt to disrupt a joint session of Congress convened to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election, which Trump had lost to Joe Biden.
At noon, President Trump addressed a large crowd near the White House, repeating claims of election fraud and urging supporters to march to the Capitol and “fight like hell.”
Around 1:00 PM, while Congress began the certification process, rioters started pushing through police barricades at the Capitol’s western perimeter. By roughly 2:13 PM, rioters broke windows and doors to enter the building, forcing both the House and Senate to recess and evacuate lawmakers to secure locations.
Five people died in connection with the event, and around 140 law enforcement officers were injured during the attack.