Read Trump’s billion dollar threat to the BBC in full
President Donald Trump threatened legal action against the BBC for editing a speech he gave on the day his supporters invaded the Capitol in 2021; The British broadcaster admitted on Monday that it was an “error of judgement”.
The president’s lawyers said the BBC must withdraw its documentary by November 14 or face a lawsuit of “not less than $1 billion”, according to a letter sent Sunday.
Documentary about the BBC’s flagship Panorama The program combined two separate quotes from one of Trump’s speeches to create the impression that he incited the Jan. 6, 2021 riot, which lawyers said was “false and defamatory.”
A spokesperson for Trump’s legal team wrote on Monday: “The BBC defamed President Trump by deliberately and fraudulently editing its documentary in an attempt to interfere with the Presidential Election. President Trump will continue to hold accountable those who traffic in lies, deception and fake news.”
Read Trump’s lawyer’s full letter to the BBC:
“Dear Friends:
This law firm serves as litigation counsel to President Donald J. Trump (hereinafter referred to as “President Trump”). Please direct all future correspondence regarding this matter to my attention. This correspondence constitutes a request, pursuant to Florida Statutes § 770.011, that you immediately retract any false, defamatory, disparaging or inflammatory statements made about President Trump and published in a newspaper. Panorama Documentary produced and broadcast by the BBC. Failure to comply will leave President Trump with no choice but to pursue all available legal rights and remedies to recover compensation for the severe financial and reputational damage caused to him by the BBC; All rights and remedies are expressly reserved by President Trump.
inside Panorama In the documentary titled “Trump: Second Chance”2, which first aired on October 28, 2024 – a week before the 2024 US presidential election – the BBC deliberately attempted to completely mislead its audience by stitching together three separate parts of President Trump’s speech to his supporters on January 6, 2021. The documentary showed President Trump telling his supporters: “We’re going to march on the Capitol and I’ll be there and we’ll be there too. We’re fighting like hell, and if you don’t fight like hell you won’t have a country anymore.”
This fabricated portrayal of President Trump was false and defamatory, given that President Trump’s actual and exact words were: “We’re going to come down and I’ll be there, we’re going to march down, we’re going to march down any of you, but I think we’re going to march right here to the Capitol and cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women.” Moreover, the BBC pulled out President Trump’s words: “I know everyone here will soon peacefully and patriotically march to the Capitol to make your voices heard.” So, as stated in an internal whistleblower memorandum, the BBC maliciously misrepresented the episode as President Trump’s “[said] things [he] I never actually said it,” he said, editing the footage from the beginning of the speech with a separate quote an hour later.
Due to their obscene nature, the fabricated statements broadcast by the BBC were widely disseminated across various digital media, reaching tens of millions of people around the world. As a result, the BBC suffered huge financial and reputational losses to President Trump.
A. Applicable law.
Words are libelous under Florida law when they “tend to cause hatred, distrust, ridicule, humiliation, or embarrassment to the person or to harm the person’s business or profession.” Johnston v. Borders, 36 F.4th 1254, 1275 (11th Cir. 2022) (citing Am. Airlines, Inc. v. Geddes, 960 So. 2d 830, 833 (Fla. 3d DCA 2007) (citation and quotation marks omitted)). Statements are defamatory if “the defendant juxtaposes a set of facts in such a way as to imply a defamatory connection between them or creates a defamatory insinuation by omitting facts.” Johnston v. Borders, 36 F.4th 1254, 1275 (11th Cir. 2022) (citing Jesus to the Jews, 997 So. 2d, 1108). Additionally, “liability may arise if the speaker or writer neglects to provide the audience with adequate factual basis before engaging in offensive discourse.” See Zambrano – Devanesan, 484 So. 2d 603, 607 (Fla. 4th DCA 1986).
Even if the BBC attempted to justify its conduct as a mere expression of its views, Florida law makes clear that such a defense would not absolve the BBC of liability. See Dershowitz v. Cable News Network, Inc., 541 F. Supp. 3d 1354, 1362 (SD Fla. 2021); see also Milkovich v. Lorain Journal Co., 497 US 1, 18-19 (1990) (“Even if the speaker states the facts on which he bases his opinion, the statement may still imply a false assertion of fact if those facts are false or incomplete, or if his assessment of them is erroneous. Stating such statements merely in terms of opinion does not eliminate such inferences.”) (emphasis added); see also Eastern Air Lines, Inc. – Gellert, 438 So. 2d 923, 927 (Fla. 3d DCA 1983) (“[A] A statement that, although ostensibly in the form of an opinion, ‘implies an allegation of undisclosed defamatory facts as the basis of the opinion’ is actionable.”) (emphasis added).
As a result, the BBC lacks any valid defense against the overwhelming reputational and financial damage that President Trump has caused it to suffer.
B. Request.
The false, defamatory, malicious, derogatory, and inflammatory statements referenced above were published for the purpose of intentionally defaming President Trump. The timing of the made-up documentary is obvious. The BBC’s reckless disregard for the truth, given that the statements are clearly false, underlines the real malevolence behind the decision to broadcast false content. Accordingly, President Trump requests the following: (1) an immediate full and fair retraction of the documentary and all other false, defamatory, disparaging, misleading, and inflammatory statements about President Trump, as conspicuous as when first published; (2) promptly apologize for any false, defamatory, disparaging, misleading, or inflammatory statements about President Trump; and (3) appropriate compensation for the harm caused to President Trump.
In addition, please allow this letter to be served as notice to you, your subsidiaries, affiliates, all their employees and others acting on behalf of or with the BBC to preserve any and all evidence relating to the above-mentioned malicious, false and defamatory statements that the BBC has published and other statements that the BBC has published about President Trump.
By this letter, the BBC is directed not to destroy, conceal or alter any paper or electronic files, physical evidence and/or in any way, however remote, relating to your false claims about President Trump and/or the circumstances that led to their dissemination, including but not limited to: (1) all communications between you and any third party relating to your false claims about President Trump; (2) All sources for your false claims regarding President Trump; (3) any documents and data that reference, reflect, or relate to communications between you and such third parties or sources regarding your false claims regarding President Trump; and (4) any documents that relate in any way to your false claims about President Trump. This includes any information claimed to be protected by Florida Statutes § 90.5015. Monarch Air Group, LLC – Journalism Dev. Network, Inc., no. 23-CV-61256, 2025 WL 445491, *1 (SD Fla. Feb. 10, 2025) (Interpreting Fla. Stat. § 90.5015, explaining that the Eleventh Circuit grants journalists a qualified privilege allowing them to resist mandatory disclosure of their professional newsgathering efforts. This privilege protects reporters from both criminal and civil lawsuits.”) (United States v. quoting Capers, 708 F.3d 1286, 1303 (11th Cir. 2013)).
I understand that many records and files are kept electronically. However, this letter specifically requests that all paper and printed originals be preserved and preserved in their original formats. Likewise, electronic documents and the storage medium on which they reside may contain relevant, discoverable information beyond what can be found in printed documents. Therefore, even where a hard copy is available and maintained, please preserve and maintain all electronically stored documents in their original native format, including all metadata. This protection claim specifically extends to all electronic documents, including but not limited to all word-processing files, emails, spreadsheets, all databases, log files, and other documents or files stored and/or created electronically.
If the BBC fails to comply with the foregoing by 5:00 PM EST on November 14, 2025, President Trump will have no choice but to exercise his legal and equitable rights, all of which are expressly reserved and not waived, including suing for not less than $1,000,000,000 (One Billion Dollars). The BBC is warning.”
