United States President, Donald Trump, has threatened to take legal action against the BBC while applauding the resignations of two of its top executives, following an escalating controversy over claims that the broadcaster’s 2024 Panorama documentary used a misleading edit of one of his speeches.
According to reports from US media outlets, Trump’s legal team has demanded that the BBC retract the documentary by Friday or face a lawsuit seeking “no less” than $1 billion (£760 million).
The BBC confirmed receipt of the legal letter and stated that it would respond in due course.
The resignations of BBC Director-General Tim Davie and News CEO Deborah Turness came after the Telegraph published a leaked internal report written by a former BBC standards adviser.
The report highlighted alleged failures in the broadcaster’s editorial practices, criticizing its coverage of transgender issues, the war in Gaza, and a doctored edit of Trump’s January 6 speech during the Capitol Hill riot.
“Thank you to The Telegraph for exposing these Corrupt ‘Journalists.’ These are very dishonest people who tried to step on the scales of a Presidential Election. On top of everything else, they are from a Foreign Country, one that many consider our Number One Ally. What a terrible thing for Democracy!,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt also appeared to celebrate Davie’s resignation. On X, she posted a screenshot of her Telegraph interview captioned “shot,” followed by the BBC article announcing Davie’s resignation, captioned “chaser.”
During her interview with the Telegraph, Leavitt branded the BBC as “100% fake news” and a “propaganda machine,” adding that watching its news bulletins while visiting the UK “ruins” her day and that taxpayers were being “forced to foot the bill for a leftist propaganda machine.”
The BBC, a publicly funded institution, has faced intensifying scrutiny in recent years. Right-leaning critics accuse it of promoting liberal viewpoints, while those on the left argue that its leadership has been overly swayed by previous Conservative governments and that it has become entangled in “culture wars” surrounding topics such as gender, race, and identity.
This climate of tension has reportedly left BBC journalists uneasy when reporting on divisive subjects, particularly the Israeli military campaign in Gaza.
Trump, both during and after his presidency, has maintained an adversarial relationship with many mainstream media organisations, often referring to them as “the enemy of the people.”
His confrontations have included lawsuits, revoking press credentials, and pressuring media platforms and companies.
The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists has warned that “press freedom is no longer a given in the United States,” asserting that the Trump administration’s approach to the media has caused lasting damage that may take decades to undo.
The leaked BBC report stated that Panorama had “completely misled” viewers by editing together two separate parts of Trump’s speech, splicing a segment about walking to the Capitol with another urging supporters to “fight like hell.”
BBC Chair Samir Shah on Monday apologized for the edit, describing it as an “error of judgment.”
On January 6, 2021, Trump delivered a speech in Washington, D.C., in which he gave mixed messages to his supporters, urging them to protest his alleged election loss while calling for peace.
He was later impeached by the House of Representatives for “incitement of insurrection,” though the Senate acquitted him after Republicans voted largely along party lines.
