 "People walk outside the BBC headquarters in London. The British broadcaster has been hit with fresh claims of misleading Trump edits. File image/Reuters")
Apologise by Friday or face a $1 billion lawsuit. That was the ultimatum that Donald Trump laid down before the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) over a misleading edit that the broadcaster made to the US president’s speech in a documentary.
And on Thursday evening (November 13), the BBC caved in and issued an apology to the American leader, but rejected his demands for compensation.
However, the apology may not mark the end of the Trump vs BBC saga, as it emerges that a second BBC show, Newsnight, also doctored Trump’s footage in 2022 and ignored concerns that were raised about it.
What is exactly going on? We explain the entire fracas.
What’s the new furore over BBC edit?
After facing flak for misleadingly editing Trump’s 2021 Capitol speech in a Panorama documentary, BBC is facing fresh accusations that BBC Newsnight also doctored footage of the US president’s speech.
On January 6, 2021, 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.” More than 50 minutes later in the speech, he said: “And we fight. We fight like hell.”
However, in the Panorama programme, the clip shows him as saying: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol… and I’ll be there with you. And we fight. We fight like hell.”
In the Newsnight programme, the edit was slightly different. He is shown as saying: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol. And we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women. And we fight. We fight like hell. And if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not gonna have a country anymore.”
This was followed by a voiceover from presenter Kirsty Wark saying “and fight they did” over footage from the Capitol riot.
According to a report in The Telegraph, a whistleblower claimed that concerns about the footage were subsequently raised during an editorial meeting the following morning, but were dismissed. David Chaudoir, an award-nominated graphic designer who worked for Newsnight from 2022 to 2024, reveals he was in the room when the clip was discussed.
“Sometimes there would be a little post-mortem of the show from the night before and… somebody brought it up saying, ‘What happened with that clip of Trump?
“One producer said, ‘How did that go out’? ‘Why did that happen?’ And the editorial editor, not the VT editor, kind of brushed it off. And I thought that that was extraordinary, that something like that had gone out,” Chaudoir was quoted as telling The Telegraph.
Does BBC have an inherent bias against Trump?
Following the new revelations, a spokesman for Trump’s legal team said, “It is now clear that BBC engaged in a pattern of defamation against President Trump by intentionally and deceitfully editing his historic speech in order to try and interfere in the presidential election.”
Even Richard Tice, the Reform UK deputy leader, noted: “With shocking news of a second Trump edit, it’s clear BBC News is infected by anti-Trump poison.
“We’ve said consistently that a larger clear-out is needed; this is the additional proof required.”
The remarks come as the Newsnight episode with Trump’s doctored speech was broadcast on June 9, 2022, whereas the Panorama documentary was aired in 2024. Many believe that this establishes a pattern by the BBC and also risks triggering new scrutiny of the claim that Panorama’s edits were an innocent mistake.
What is BBC saying?
Responding to the new claims, the BBC said it was looking into the matter. “The BBC holds itself to the highest editorial standards,” said a BBC spokesperson, in response to the latest Telegraph report.
“This matter has been brought to our attention and we are now looking into it.”
It has also issued an apology to US President Trump over the Panorama incident. It said it had reviewed the Panorama programme after the criticism.
“We accept that our edit unintentionally created the impression that we were showing a single continuous section of the speech, rather than excerpts from different points in the speech, and that this gave the mistaken impression that President Trump had made a direct call for violent action,” it said.
Moreover, BBC’s chair, Samir Shah, has also written to the White House on the issue of the edit. “BBC chair Samir Shah has separately sent a personal letter to the White House making clear to President Trump that he and the corporation are sorry for the edit of the president’s speech on January 6, 2021, which featured in the programme,” said lawyers of the BBC.
They added: “While the BBC sincerely regrets the manner in which the video clip was edited, we strongly disagree there is a basis for a defamation claim.”
The apology by the BBC comes after Trump’s lawyers sent a letter to the broadcaster earlier this week, threatening to sue. The US president’s lawyers said the broadcaster must retract the controversial documentary by Friday or face a lawsuit for “no less” than $1 billion.
Notably, it is the Panorama edits that led to the resignations of BBC’s two top executives — Tim Davie, the director-general, and Deborah Turness, the chief executive of BBC News.
What has been UK PM’s Keir Starmer’s response?
On Wednesday, before claims of the second edit emerged, British Prime Minister Keir said that the BBC should “get their house in order”. Speaking in parliament, Starmer said he supported a “strong and independent BBC” but he also believed it should “uphold the highest standards to be accountable and correct errors quickly”.
“Where mistakes are made, they do need to get their house in order,” he said.
With inputs from agencies