Donald Trump says he has ‘obligation’ to sue BBC over speech edit – latest updates

Trump says he has ‘obligation’ to sue BBC

Good morning and welcome to our coverage of the continuing fallout at the BBC as Donald Trump claimed the broadcaster had “defrauded the public” and he had an “obligation” to take legal action over the editing of a speech.

Director-general Tim Davie quit on Sunday amid criticisms over the editing of a speech by Trump before the attack on the US Capitol on January 6 2021 in an edition of Panorama which aired last year just before the 2024 presidential election.

The US president reiterated his threat of launching a $1bn legal action during an interview on Fox News. He said:

I think I have an obligation to do it, you can’t allow people to do that.

I guess I have to. They defrauded the public and they’ve admitted it. This is within one of our great allies, supposedly our great ally [the UK].

That’s a pretty sad event. They actually changed my January 6 speech, which was a beautiful speech, which was a very calming speech, and they made it sound radical.

The edit suggested Trump told the crowd:

We’re going to walk down to the Capitol and I’ll be there with you, and we fight. We fight like hell.

The words were taken from sections of his speech almost an hour apart.

A legal letter, from Trump counsel Alejandro Brito, has demanded that “false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory statements” made about Trump be retracted immediately.

The letter says if the BBC “does not comply”, the president will be “left with no alternative but to enforce his legal and equitable rights, all of which are expressly reserved and are not waived, including by filing legal action for no less than 1,000,000,000 dollars in damages”.

Updated at 02.36 EST

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MPs and BBC staff call for Robbie Gibb to leave broadcaster’s boardMichael Savage

MPs and BBC staff members have called for Robbie Gibb to be removed from the corporation’s board as outgoing director general Tim Davie hit out at the “weaponisation” of criticisms of the broadcaster.

In an online meeting with Davie, staff questioned the position of Gibb, Theresa May’s former communications chief, who was appointed during Boris Johnson’s time as prime minister.

Several said Gibb and all political appointees should be removed from the body. It has been claimed that Gibb pushed accusations of institutional bias that preceded the shock resignation of Davie and Deborah Turness, the head of BBC News.

Their departures over the weekend followed accusations of bias made in a memo by Michael Prescott, a former independent external adviser to the BBC’s editorial guidelines and standards committee. He left that role in the summer.

His memo was leaked to the Daily Telegraph last week and reported over the course of several days.

It included criticism of the way Panorama broadcast edited footage of a Donald Trump speech, which has since led the US president to threaten a $1bn legal action. Prescott made a series of other claims of a more general liberal bias on issues such as trans rights and Gaza.

Robbie Gibb was appointed to the BBC board in 2021 by Boris Johnson. Photograph: Bloomberg/Getty Images

While the BBC has acknowledged failings, concern has grown over Gibb’s position on the board amid suggestions that he played a role in both pushing Prescott’s claims and in Prescott being awarded the advisory role. Both Gibb and Prescott have now been summoned to give evidence to the Commons culture, media and sport committee.

Thanking staff for their support at the meeting, Davie reassured them that the narrative around the corporation “will not just be given by our enemies” after a week in which senior politicians have accused the BBC of systemic bias in its reporting.

“I do hear everyone when we have to be very clear and stand up for our journalism,” he said. “We are in a unique and precious organisation. I see the free press under pressure. I see the weaponisation. I think we’ve got a fight for our journalism. I’m really proud of our work.”

Liberal Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper said the crisis at the BBC has provided an “opportunity” to “take away all the people who were political appointees”.

According to the PA news agency, Cooper told BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme:

We Liberal Democrats don’t think that there should be any political appointees and we would like to see legislation to bring back the independent appointments process for the BBC board.

The St Albans MP added:

I do think that this crisis in the BBC provides an opportunity for us to clear up the BBC and to make sure we can safeguard its independence for future.

When you look at independent editorial decisions that have been made on particular stories, there’s no doubt in my mind that the BBC has, on a number of occasions, been pretty sloppy, and it’s been very slow at correcting them.

But I think ultimately this is an opportunity, this crisis, and the way we make the most of that, to protect the BBC, to safeguard its future and to protect its independence, is to make sure that we can take away all the people who were political appointees.

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