President Trump sued the BBC for $10 billion on Monday evening over the editing in a documentary that the British broadcaster said had left the “mistaken impression” that he called for violent action before the storming of the U.S. Capitol.
In a 46-page lawsuit filed in federal court in Miami, Mr. Trump accused the BBC of defaming him and violating Florida’s Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act. He demanded $5 billion for each offense.
In a statement, the president’s legal team said that the lawsuit was designed to hold the British network accountable for what it described as wrongdoing.
“The formerly respected and now disgraced BBC defamed President Trump by intentionally, maliciously and deceptively doctoring his speech in a brazen attempt to interfere in the 2024 presidential election,” the statement said.
Mr. Trump said last month that he planned to file a $1 billion suit against the BBC for its 2024 documentary, “Trump: A Second Chance?” He later told reporters on Air Force One that he planned to sue for as much as $5 billion.
“I think I have to do it,” he said at the time. “They have even admitted that they cheated.”
The BBC documentary was broadcast before last year’s presidential election on the network’s flagship “Panorama” program. It received little notice until recently, when The Daily Telegraph, a leading Tory-aligned London newspaper, reported last month that an internal review at the BBC had criticized the way the program was edited.
In the documentary, Mr. Trump is shown speaking to the crowd on the Washington Mall on Jan. 6, 2021. The network spliced two clips of the president speaking about 50 minutes apart, leaving the impression that he was urging people to participate in the riot that later broke out at the Capitol.
Mr. Trump’s lawsuit cited the internal review at the BBC, which concluded that there had been “a string of incidents that demonstrate serious bias in the corporation’s reporting.”
The revelation of the criticism in the internal review led to the abrupt resignations of the BBC’s director general, Tim Davie, and the chief executive of BBC News, Deborah Turness. Samir Shah, the network’s board chairman, apologized in a letter to a parliamentary committee, saying the editing had been an “error of judgment.”
Mr. Shah also apologized directly to Mr. Trump. But Mr. Shah and network officials rejected claims that Mr. Trump had reason to sue or that the error was evidence of a fundamental bias in the BBC’s news reporting.
“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 network wrote in a statement after Mr. Trump’s legal threat.
Mr. Trump has pursued legal actions against numerous news organizations. CBS and its parent company, Paramount, paid $16 million to settle a suit he filed over the editing of an interview on “60 Minutes.”
Last year, ABC paid $16 million to settle a defamation suit related to on-air remarks by the anchor George Stephanopoulos.
The president also has a defamation lawsuit pending against The New York Times, which accuses the news organization of trying to undercut his 2024 candidacy and disparage his reputation. The Times says the lawsuit has no merit.
Michael D. Shear is a senior Times correspondent covering British politics and culture, and diplomacy around the world.
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