The BBC has announced it will mount a defence against a defamation lawsuit threatened by United States President Donald Trump, expected to be filed this week.
On Monday, Samir Shah, the chair of the BBC’s board, said the British broadcaster is prepared to fight any complaint the president files.
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“I want to be very clear with you — our position has not changed. There is no basis for a defamation case, and we are determined to fight this,” Shah wrote in a letter to BBC staff.
The letter follows an announcement on Friday from President Trump, saying that he planned to proceed with a lawsuit in the coming days.
“We’ll sue them for anywhere between a billion and $5bn, probably some time next week,” Trump told reporters on Air Force One. “I think I have to do it.”
The controversy stems from the editing of a documentary for the investigative television series Panorama, titled Trump: A Second Chance?
The documentary aired in October 2024, days before Trump won his second term as president that November.
Trump and his allies have alleged that the Panorama documentary sought to misrepresent his statements on January 6, 2021, when a group of his supporters violently stormed the US Capitol in an attempt to disrupt the certification of the 2020 election.
The Republican leader had lost that election to his Democratic rival Joe Biden. But he has falsely maintained that his defeat was due to widespread voter fraud.
The Panorama documentary edited together two separate quotes from Trump’s speech on the day of the riot that were delivered nearly an hour apart.
Together, they appeared to show Trump encouraging his supporters to “fight like hell” after walking down to the Capitol.
Trump and his supporters say that the edit was misleading and that it leaves out critical context. At one point in the speech, for example, Trump told his supporters “to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard”.
Trump also followed his appeal to walk down to the Capitol by calling on his supporters to “cheer on our brave senators and Congressmen and women”.
Tumult at the BBC
The controversy over the documentary has roiled the BBC at a time when the broadcaster faces allegations of internal bias, leaked to the media.
Earlier this month, The Daily Telegraph published an internal BBC memo in which a former adviser, Michael Prescott, expressed concern about “systemic problems” in the broadcaster’s coverage of hot-button topics, including transgender rights and Israel’s war on Gaza, which experts have identified as a genocide.
The BBC has repeatedly denied institutional bias, and its leadership has stood by the quality of its reporting.
But the scrutiny has led to a shake-up in the broadcaster’s leadership. On November 9, its director general Tim Davie and its news head Deborah Turness both resigned in separate letters to BBC staff.
“Overall the BBC is delivering well, but there have been some mistakes made and as director general I have to take ultimate responsibility,” Davie wrote in his letter.
“Our organisation is a critical ingredient of a healthy society, as well as a thriving creative sector. We should champion it, not weaponise it.”
Last week, amid Trump’s threats of a lawsuit, the BBC issued a “personal letter” of apology to the US president.
It said Shah and the BBC were “sorry for the edit of the President’s speech”, according to a spokesperson’s statement. It also confirmed that the documentary would not be rebroadcast.
But Shah and the BBC nevertheless stood firm against the prospect of a lawsuit.
“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 statement said.
A history of suing the news media
Trump has a history of pursuing legal claims against news media he finds disfavourable, even when experts say his claims lack legal merit.
Last year, for instance, Trump filed a defamation lawsuit against ABC News after an anchor in a live interview incorrectly said the US president had been “found liable for rape”.
He had been found liable for sexual abuse, not rape, in a civil case brought by writer E Jean Carroll.
ABC News agreed to pay $15m to settle the lawsuit in December 2024.
Trump also sued CBS News for its editing of an interview with his 2024 election rival, Democrat Kamala Harris, on the TV programme 60 Minutes.
In July, CBS’s parent company Paramount agreed to a settlement of $16m, which came as the company sought the Trump administration’s approval to proceed with a merger.
Last month, Trump also refiled a separate defamation lawsuit against The New York Times, one month after a federal judge threw it out.
In Monday’s letter, BBC chair Shah noted the cost such a lawsuit could exact on the BBC and its viewers, who pay a licensing fee to watch its products.
“In all this we are, of course, acutely aware of the privilege of our funding and the need to protect our license fee payers, the British public,” Shah wrote.
Legal experts believe Trump’s claims against the BBC face an uphill battle, particularly in the US, where the First Amendment of the Constitution includes strong safeguards for the news media.
