The head of the main public broadcasting service in Britain said on Monday, November 17th that his organisation will challenge the defamation lawsuit threatened by U.S. president Donald Trump.
“There is no basis for the defamation case, and we are determined to fight it,” Samir Shah said in a message to staff, following a BBC documentary that edited together two sections of a Trump speech, giving the impression that the president incited violence at January 6th Capitol protests.
Trump announced on Friday that he would sue the BBC for up to $5 billion (€4.3 billion). The announcement came after the broadcaster apologised, but said it would not pay damages for the misleadingly edited segment.
Although Shah rejects Trump’s defamation claim, the President himself appears determined to pursue it—even after the departure of BBC executives and amid concerns that the controversy is straining relations between Washington and London.
The edited video excerpt in question was broadcast ahead of the 2024 presidential election, giving the impression that Trump directly incited “violent action,” prior to his supporters storming the US Capitol on January 6, 2021. The row then also prompted the ‘reappearance’ of a similarly edited clip, first shown on the channel in 2022.
Trump’s threats have sparked widespread debate in the UK over ideological ‘bias’ at the BBC and whether the publicly funded corporation should continue in its current form.
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