FIRST ON FOX— President Donald Trump is seeking to hold the BBC responsible for “false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory statements,” giving the British broadcaster a Friday deadline to make things right or face a $1 billion lawsuit.
The BBC has been engulfed in criticism over a BBC Panorama documentary about Trump’s Jan. 6, 2021, speech that he delivered before the attack on the U.S. Capitol. Critics believe the documentary was wildly misleading because it omitted Trump urging supporters to protest peacefully, and the BBC director-general Tim Davie and BBC News and Current Affairs chief Deborah Turness both stepped down in recent days amid the growing controversy.
Now, Trump is acting, and his litigation counsel sent a scathing notice of intent to bring a civil action lawsuit on Sunday to BBC Chair Samir Shah, along with general counsel Sarah Jones. The letter, which has been obtained by Fox News Digital, demands that “false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory statements” made about Trump must be retracted immediately.
Trump’s legal team said the statements in the documentary were “fabricated and aired by the BBC,” giving the president no choice than to take legal action.
“Failure to comply will leave President Trump with no choice but to pursue any and all legal rights and remedies available to recover damages for the overwhelming financial and reputational harm that the BBC has caused him to suffer, with all rights and remedies being expressly reserved by President Trump,” the letter states.
“In the Panorama documentary, titled ‘Trump: A Second Chance,’ which was first broadcast on October 28, 2024—a week before the 2024 United States presidential election—the BBC intentionally sought to completely mislead its viewers by splicing together three separate parts of President Trump’s speech to supporters,” the letter continues. “The documentary showed President Trump telling supporters: ‘We’re gonna walk down to the Capitol, and I’ll be there with you and we fight. We fight like hell and if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.’”
According to the letter, Trump actually said, “We’re going to walk down, and I’ll be there with you, we’re going to walk down, we’re going to walk down any one of you but I think right here, we’re going to walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women.”
The letter, penned by Trump attorney Alejandro Brito, then explained that BBC also edited out Trump saying, “I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.”Brito accused the BBC of defamation under Florida law.
“Due to their salacious nature, the fabricated statements that were aired by the BBC have been widely disseminated throughout various digital mediums, which have reached tens of millions of people worldwide. Consequently, the BBC has caused President Trump to suffer overwhelming financial and reputational harm,” Brito wrote on behalf of Trump.
“Consequently, the BBC lacks any viable defense to the overwhelming reputational and financial harm it has caused President Trump to suffer.”Trump’s legal team feels “the BBC’s reckless disregard for the truth underscores the actual malice behind the decision to publish the wrongful content, given the plain falsity of the statements.”
The president demands “a full and fair retraction of the documentary and any and all other false, defamatory, disparaging, misleading, and inflammatory statements about President Trump in as conspicuous a manner as they were originally published,” an immediate apology and compensation.
The BBC is looking into the situation.
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