President Donald Trump filed a lawsuit Monday seeking $10 billion in damages from the BBC, accusing the British broadcaster of defamation as well as deceptive and unfair trade practices.
The 33-page lawsuit accuses the BBC of broadcasting a “false, defamatory, deceptive, disparaging, inflammatory, and malicious depiction of President Trump,” calling it “a brazen attempt to interfere in and influence” the 2024 U.S. presidential election.
It accused the BBC of “splicing together two entirely separate parts of President Trump’s speech on January 6, 2021” in order to ”intentionally misrepresent the meaning of what President Trump said.”
The BBC did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press.
The broadcaster had apologized last month to Trump over the edit of the Jan. 6 speech. But the publicly funded broadcaster rejected claims it had defamed him, after Trump threatened legal action.
BBC chairman Samir Shah had called it an “error of judgment,” which triggered the resignations of the BBC’s top executive and its head of news.
The speech took place before some of Trump’s supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol as Congress was poised to certify President-elect Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election that Trump falsely alleged was stolen from him.
The BBC had broadcast the hourlong documentary — titled “Trump: A Second Chance?” — days before the 2024 U.S. presidential election. It spliced together three quotes from two sections of the 2021 speech, delivered almost an hour apart, into what appeared to be one quote in which Trump urged supporters to march with him and “fight like hell.” Among the parts cut out was a section where Trump said he wanted supporters to demonstrate peacefully.
Trump said earlier Monday that he was suing the BBC “for putting words in my mouth.”
“They actually put terrible words in my mouth having to do with Jan. 6 that I didn’t say, and they’re beautiful words, that I said, right?” the president said unprompted during an appearance in the Oval Office. “They’re beautiful words, talking about patriotism and all of the good things that I said. They didn’t say that, but they put terrible words.”
The president’s lawsuit was filed in Florida. Deadlines to bring the case in British courts expired more than a year ago.
Legal experts have brought up potential challenges to a case in the U.S. given that the documentary was not shown in the country.
The lawsuit alleges that people in the U.S. can watch the BBC’s original content, including the “Panorama” series, which included the documentary, by using the subscription streaming platform BritBox.
The 103-year-old BBC is a national institution funded through an annual license fee of 174.50 pounds ($230) paid by every household that watches live TV or BBC content. Bound by the terms of its charter to be impartial, it typically faces especially intense scrutiny and criticism from both conservatives and liberals.
(AP)
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2 Responses
Even if Trump wins, a judgment would be worthless since the BBC has no assets in the United States. In addition Trump will have a time time convincing he was damaged by the broadcast, considering he won the election. And while BBC programs are streamable in the United States, they are streamed by corporations who purchase the rights in Britain. Trump should have sued under British law, and its seems to be legal malpractice not to have done so.
The BBC, and The New York Times, like all the other ultra Liberal media outlets are consistently biased against moderate politicians and the reporting of events. They bend over backwards to downplay terrorist acts committed by certified terrorists. Even the description of the perpetrators is twisted. They describe them as “freedom Fighters” instead of brutal terrorist murderers. The words & actions of moderate or conservative politicians Are always overblown & taken out of context.
Yet, those same leftist & terrorist sympathizers are not satisfied. They accuse the media outlets of not supporting their actions.
Examples are too numerous to count. Just like in President Donald Trump’s case. They spliced 2 segments of his speech into 1 “report”. Making it appear that he incited the crowd to riot on Jan. 6. That is malicious & false reporting. His lawsuit is justified.