Donald Trump had already made clear he intended to sue the BBC. The question was how much he’d seek in his civil lawsuit.
A month ago, the president said he expected to ask for $1 billion. Soon after, the Republican suggested the figure could be $5 billion. Evidently, he and his lawyers decided to double that figure. The New York Times reported:
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.
The Republican’s legal team condemned the BBC as a “disgraced” news organization, which coincided with Trump telling reporters that the network “literally put words in my mouth.”
He added, “I guess they used AI. … They actually put terrible words in my mouth having to do with Jan. 6 that I didn’t say.”
As is too often the case, the president’s comments were wrong. For one thing, the BBC didn’t use artificial intelligence. For another, the network did air a program that edited Trump’s Jan. 6 speech, connecting two clips that were delivered roughly 50 minutes apart, but the news outlet didn’t manufacture words and phrases out of whole cloth.
Nevertheless, the editing has sparked a broader controversy that has led to an internal investigation. That, in turn, generated some firings among senior BBC officials as well as a written apology.
Trump, however, apparently doesn’t want an apology. He wants $10 billion.
For its part, the BBC’s legal counsel vowed to defend itself from the defamation litigation, and as NBC News’ report noted, the network’s willingness to fight back raises the possibility “of a legal battle over whether the edit of the speech caused harm to the president’s reputation.”
As this legal process advances, let’s not lose sight of the pattern that’s developed in recent years.
The Trump campaign’s 2020 case against CNN failed. Trump’s 2021 case against The New York Times failed. Trump’s 2023 case against Bob Woodward failed. The Trump campaign’s case against The Washington Post failed. Trump’s so-called class-action lawsuit against social media giants also failed. A separate Trump case against CNN failed. The most recent Trump lawsuit against the New York Times is off to a humiliating start.
I mention this in part because Americans have never had a sitting president who sued independent news organizations or individual journalists for publishing reports the White House disapproved of — until now.
But the same pattern also includes a lesson. When the Republican filed a dubious case against ABC News, the network and its corporate parent agreed to a $16 million settlement. When he filed an even weaker case against CBS News, its corporate parent, Paramount, also struck a $16 million deal.
In the weeks and months that followed, Trump repeatedly pointed to these controversial settlement agreements as evidence of his targets’ culpability, even as those networks denied any wrongdoing.
Meanwhile, news organizations that have stood up for themselves and pushed back against the attempts at intimidation prevailed.
The only way to lose in a fight against Trump is to pursue a course rooted in appeasement. It’s true when it comes to law firms; it’s true when it comes to higher education; and it’s true in his court fights against news organizations — a point that hopefully isn’t lost on the BBC or its defense counsel.
This post updates our related earlier coverage.
