Trump drops BBC Studios from $10 billion defamation lawsuit

MUMBAI: The courtroom script has taken a fresh edit, this time, one of the defendants has been cut from the cast. US President Donald Trump has narrowed his $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the BBC, dropping the broadcaster’s commercial arm, BBC Studios, while continuing legal action against the British Broadcasting Corporation itself.

Fresh court documents filed in the US District Court for the Southern District of Florida show that all claims against BBC Studios have been dismissed with prejudice, meaning they cannot be brought again. Under the agreement, each side will bear its own legal costs and attorney’s fees.

The filing states: “All claims in this action asserted against the Studios Defendants are hereby dismissed with prejudice… President Trump shall continue prosecuting his causes of action against Defendant British Broadcasting Corporation.”

Trump originally filed the 33-page lawsuit in December last year, alleging that a BBC Panorama documentary, Trump: A Second Chance?, falsely edited footage of his 6 January 2021 speech outside the White House to portray him as encouraging supporters to attack the US Capitol.

According to the complaint, the broadcaster created “a false, defamatory, deceptive, disparaging, inflammatory and malicious depiction” of the President through the edited sequence.

The controversy centres on two excerpts from Trump’s speech. In the original address, Trump said: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women.” However, the Panorama documentary combined that footage with a separate remark made more than 50 minutes later, in which Trump said: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol… and I’ll be there with you. And we fight. We fight like hell.”

The BBC has previously acknowledged that the clip was edited in a way it regretted and issued a formal apology over the sequence. However, the broadcaster has rejected Trump’s claim for damages and continues to dispute the legal basis of the lawsuit.

In a court filing dated 25 June, the BBC argued that the documentary was not distributed in the United States through BritBox, BBC.com, BBC Select, NPR, PBS or any other US broadcaster, challenging key allegations contained in Trump’s complaint.

The case has taken another twist with reports that the US government is considering joining the litigation. According to The Telegraph, such a move could allow certain requested documents including phone records or diary entries to be withheld under claims of executive privilege or national security.

The dispute also follows the emergence of a leaked internal BBC memo by independent adviser Michael Prescott, who reportedly concluded that Trump: A Second Chance? appeared to take “a distinctly anti-Trump stance”.

Although BBC Studios is no longer part of the case, the legal battle is far from over. With Trump continuing his claims against the BBC and questions surrounding the documentary’s editing still at the heart of the dispute, the lawsuit remains one of the most closely watched media defamation cases involving a global broadcaster and a sitting US President.