OAN Staff Katherine Mosack
1:51 PM – Friday, November 14, 2025
The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) has formally apologized to President Donald Trump after a recently resurfaced documentary contained misleading editing of a speech the president gave on January 6, 2021.
Trump’s lawyers called a 2024 Panorama documentary series clip defamatory and false, suggesting that the edit portrayed him as inciting a riot when the unedited footage had more of a subdued message. The special, “Trump: A Second Chance?” aired only a week before the 2024 presidential election.
“We’re going to walk down — and I’ll be there with you. … We’re going to walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave Senators and Congressmen and women,” Trump said in the original speech, adding later, “I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.”
In the BBC’s edited version, however, Trump seemingly says, “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol, and I’ll be there with you. And we fight. We fight like hell. And if you don’t fight like hell you’re not gonna have a country anymore.”
It was revealed later that the Panorama program “frankensteined” together three video clips, one moment taken from almost an hour after the first two sections.
Michael Prescott, a former independent external adviser to the BBC’s Editorial Guidelines and Standards Committee (EGSC), wrote up a 19-page dossier about the questionable editing in the Panorama special. He argued that “in the worst-case scenario, it does appear to be an attempt to influence the election,” although he acknowledged it’s unlikely that many Americans actually watched the program before the election.
Despite tricky legal concerns, Trump threatened to sue the corporation for $1 billion unless it retracted the documentary, apologizing for what his lawyers described as “overwhelming financial and reputational harm” that would befall the company.
One of the president’s lawyers, attorney Alejandro Brito, sent a letter to the BBC formally threatening a $1 billion lawsuit, CNN reported on Monday. The letter demanded a “full and fair retraction of the documentary and any other false, defamatory, disparaging, misleading, and inflammatory statements about President Trump,” as well as an immediate apology, and appropriate compensation, setting a deadline for 5:00 p.m. EST on Friday, November 14th.
Two top BBC leaders, Director-General Tim Davie and Head of News Deborah Turness, resigned on Sunday after the incident.
The BBC acknowledged that their 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,” in a correction note issued on Thursday.
According to a spokesperson, BBC chair Samir Shah sent a letter to the White House on Sunday to personally apologize for the edit and to assure the administration that the BBC has no intention of rebroadcasting the documentary on any platforms.
“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 spokesperson said.
The British government responded to the incident, highlighting the BBC’s importance to the country during a polarized political climate.
“It is by far the most widely used and trusted source of news in the United Kingdom,” Lisa Nandy, a member of parliament from the Labour Party, told fellow lawmakers. “At a time when the lines are being dangerously blurred between fact and opinion, news and polemic, the BBC stands apart.”
English viewers have phoned into a BBC radio program to express their fury over the possibility of Trump suing the taxpayer-funded broadcasting company.
“If we have to pay a penny to Trump, then I’m sorry — I’m not going to pay my TV license,” one caller said. “The world just seems to be frightened of him. I think the BBC needs to stand up to him.”
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