The BBC apologised to former US President Donald Trump on Thursday for an edited Panorama segment that fused separate parts of his 6 January 2021 speech and “gave the mistaken impression that President Trump had made a direct call for violent action.” The corporation rejected his demand for $1 billion in compensation and said it would not re-air the 2024 programme.
The issue triggered the resignations of director general Tim Davie and head of news Deborah Turness on Sunday, deepening the crisis at the broadcaster. BBC News has requested comment from the White House.
The apology came hours after the Daily Telegraph highlighted a second edited clip, aired on Newsnight in 2022, that similarly stitched together different lines from the same speech.
In its Thursday evening Corrections and Clarifications notice, the BBC said a review found the Panorama edit “unintentionally created the impression” of a continuous passage. “We accept that our edit unintentionally created the impression that we were showing a single continuous section of the speech,” it said.
A spokesperson confirmed that BBC lawyers had written to Trump’s legal team in response to a letter received Sunday. “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 6 January 2021,” the spokesperson said, while emphasising that “we strongly disagree there is a basis for a defamation claim.”
The segment in question combined Trump’s lines “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women” with his later remark “And we fight. We fight like hell.” In Panorama, the edit presented the lines as one continuous statement.
Speaking to Fox News, Trump said the speech had been “butchered” and argued that viewers had been “defrauded.”
His lawyers have demanded a “full and fair retraction,” an apology and financial compensation for alleged harm. They set a deadline of 22:00 GMT Friday. In its reply, the BBC outlined five reasons it believes the defamation threat lacks merit.
The corporation argued the programme did not air on its US channels and was available only in the UK. It said the broadcast caused no harm, citing Trump’s re-election soon after, and maintained the clip was shortened for editorial purposes rather than to mislead. It also said the 12 second excerpt appeared within a much broader documentary containing voices supportive of Trump. Finally, it noted that opinions related to political matters are strongly protected under US defamation law.
A BBC insider said staff believe firmly in the strength of the corporation’s case.
Earlier Thursday, the Telegraph reported that a 2022 Newsnight segment also joined separate lines from the speech. Afterwards, former White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney said the edit had “spliced together” remarks that were not delivered consecutively.
A BBC spokesperson said the broadcaster “holds itself to the highest editorial standards” and is reviewing the issue.
Trump’s legal team told the Telegraph it is “now clear that BBC engaged in a pattern of defamation against President Trump.”
The controversy intensified after the leak of an internal memo by a former adviser to the BBC’s editorial standards committee, which also criticised the broadcaster’s coverage of other sensitive topics.
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