President Donald Trump escalated his feud with the BBC on Friday vowing to sue the British broadcaster for up to $5 billion over a "Panorama" documentary that spliced his January 6, 2021, speech to falsely imply he urged supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol.
"What BBC did, nobody would even think of a thing like that. They actually changed the words coming out of my mouth," Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One, adding: "We'll sue them. We'll sue them for anywhere between a billion and $5B, probably some time next week."
The threat, up from an initial $1 billion demand, follows a leaked internal BBC memo exposing the edit as a deliberate distortion aired just days before the 2024 U.S. election.
But the edit juxtaposed "We're going to walk down to the Capitol... and I'll be there with you" with "And we fight. We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore," creating an impression of direct incitement to violence.
The edit triggered a cascade of resignations at the BBC: Director General Tim Davie and News CEO Deborah Turness stepped down on November 10, 2025, citing the scandal's damage to the institution. BBC Chair Samir Shah called it an "error of judgment" in a letter to Parliament's Culture, Media and Sport Committee, noting over 500 viewer complaints. Shah personally apologized to Trump via a White House letter, admitting the clip "did give the impression of a direct call for violent action," and the BBC has pulled the documentary from all platforms, vowing not to rebroadcast it.
Legal experts are skeptical of Trump's odds: Florida's one-year statute of limitations for defamation may bar the suit (the episode aired October 28, 2024), and proving U.S. harm from a non-U.S. broadcast could be tough.