Kayla Epstein and Madeline Halpert
BBC News
US President Donald Trump threatened to sue the BBC with a $1 billion damages claim, claiming that the media organization made "false, defamatory, disparaging and inflammatory claims" about him in a documentary.
In a letter to the BBC, Trump's legal team demands that it issue a "full and fair retraction" of the documentary, apologize, and that the BBC "appropriately compensate President Trump for the harm caused to him."
The leaked memo, written by a former independent external adviser to the BBC's editorial standards board, suggests that Panorama's show edited parts of Trump's speech so that they were spliced together and made it appear as if he was explicitly encouraging riots in Washington in January 2021.
The one-hour show 'Trump: A Second Chance' was broadcast in the UK just before US presidential election 2024.
So how strong is Trump's case?
BBC Chairman Samir Shah apologized, saying the broadcaster had made an "error of judgment" because the edit created the impression of Trump's "direct call to action."
"I think we did make a mistake and there was a breach of editorial standards," said outgoing BBC Director General Tim Davey, who resigned due to criticism.
But legal experts on US media and defamation say Trump's announced lawsuit faces significant obstacles to obtaining such a huge amount of damages from the BBC, in part because of strict US press freedom laws.
The controversy began after the London Telegraph published a leaked memo criticizing the documentary in question and the way Trump's speech was edited.
Trump actually said, "We're going to walk to the Capitol and salute our brave senators and congressmen and women."
However, in Panorama's montage, he is shown saying, "We're going to walk to the Capitol... and I'll be there with you. And we're going to fight. We're going to fight like hell."
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Trump delivered a speech at the Ellipse Park as Congress prepared to certify the 2020 election results and declare Joseph Biden the winner.
A few minutes after he finished speaking, a large crowd of his supporters stormed the Congress building.
A few days later, the US House of Representatives voted to Impeach Trump on the grounds of "incitement to insurrection", and the Senate later acquitted of charges.
Trump says his speech was "perfect."
The White House responded to the Telegraph's article, and its press secretary called the BBC "complete, 100 percent fake news."
Watch a video about the riots in Washington, D.C., in January 2021.
The resignations of Davey and BBC News Executive Director Deborah Tarns were followed by Trump's threat of legal action.
In a letter to the BBC, Trump's lawyers said that in the documentary, the British public broadcaster "deliberately sought to completely mislead viewers" by combining three separate clips from his speech.
The BBC caused the president "enormous financial damage, as well as damage to his reputation," it added.
In a later interview with Fox News, Trump said that has an "obligation" to sue the BBC.
"My speech was butchered... people shouldn't be allowed to do that," he said.
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The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution provides significant protection for freedom of speech and freedom of the press.
The Supreme Court's landmark 1964 decision in New York Times v. Sullivan established that public figures suing for defamation must prove "actual malice," meaning that "the statement was made with knowledge of its untruthfulness or with reckless disregard for whether it was true or false."
Trump would have to prove three big things - that the published content was factually incorrect in a way that is defamatory; that he was harmed by the false and defamatory reporting; and that the media organization knew it was false and acted with "actual malice."
"They all present some difficulties for the plaintiff, I would say," George Freeman, executive director of the Media Law Resource Center in New York, told BBC Radio 4.
But not everyone agrees with that.
Bert Newborn, professor emeritus at New York University School of Law, said Trump has a case against the BBC because the editing of Trump's statements was misleading.
The mistake is not limited to "innocent chopping" of speech, he points out.
“The real evil intent here is the awareness of spreading something that was presented as literal, but wasn’t,” said Newborn, a former national legal director at the American Civil Liberties Union.
It's less likely that a jury would actually award Trump substantial damages for such a mistake, he added.
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Trump has indicated his intention to file any lawsuit in the US state of Florida, rather than in the United Kingdom.
The statute of limitations - or time limit for filing a lawsuit - for defamation in the UK is one year, which has already passed for Trump, because the documentary aired in October 2024, on the eve of the presidential election (November of that year).
Florida, on the other hand, has a two-year limit.
Although Florida law gives him more time, filing a defamation lawsuit in the United States would mean Trump would face stricter legal standards.
If Trump were to sue in Florida, he would also have to prove that the BBC's Panorama documentary could have been viewed in the US.
So far, there is no evidence to suggest that it was shown in the US.
The BBC's best chance of having any future legal action dismissed is to argue that the state is not the proper jurisdiction, because there was "not enough exposure to the information in Florida," says Newborn.
Trump's letter to the BBC ends with a promise that if the BBC does not comply with the demands by November 14, "President Trump will be left with no alternative but to exercise his legal and equitable rights, all of which are expressly asserted and none of which are waived, including filing a lawsuit for no less than $1 billion in damages."
But to get $1 billion in damages in a defamation lawsuit in Florida, a plaintiff, such as the president, would have to prove that he actually suffered that much loss, says Professor Larissa Lidsky of the Levin School of Law at the University of Florida.
"Considering that after this he won the presidential election"And even if he continued to make money through his companies, it seems implausible that he would be able to prove damages of a billion dollars," she said.
Watch this video: 'It was a matter of life or death' - photographer on the riots in Washington
Trump has so far sued several American media outlets and media organizations for huge sums of money and in several cases secured large settlements.
Paramount, the parent company of CBS News, agreed to pay Trump $16 million in 2025 after he sued them over an interview on 60 Minutes with then-presidential candidate Kamala Harris.
Trump claimed that the video was edited to portray Harris - against whom he was campaigning at the time - in a better light.
ABC News also paid Trump $15 million after one of its anchors, George Stephanopoulos, falsely claimed in an interview that Trump had been found guilty of rape.
Trump was found liable for sexual assault and defamation journalist and writer I. Jean Carroll in 2023.
He sued The New York Times for $15 billion over critical comments reporters made against him during his 2024 presidential campaign.
A federal judge dismissed the case in September because it was filed in "inappropriate and impermissible form," but allowed Trump to file a shorter appeal.
Many of Trump's lawsuits against media organizations have cost him very little, while they can prove very costly for media outlets, said Seth Stern, director of advocacy for the Freedom of the Press Foundation.
"He doesn't care whether he wins in court or not."
"The point is to intimidate and punish those he perceives as critical of him," Stern said.
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