LONDON, U.K.: Rejecting an attempt by the British Broadcasting Corporation to delay proceedings, a U.S. judge announced on February 11 that President Donald Trump can proceed with his trial in the US$10 billion lawsuit against Britain's national broadcaster in 2027.
Judge Roy K. Altman of the federal court for the Southern District of Florida set a provisional start date of February 15, 2027, for a two-week trial.
Donald Trump sued the BBC in December, saying it wrongly edited a speech he gave on January 6, 2021. He is asking for $5 billion for defamation and another $5 billion for unfair business practices.
The speech happened shortly before some of Trump's supporters stormed the United States Capitol while Congress was preparing to confirm Joe Biden as the winner of the 2020 election, which Trump had falsely claimed was stolen.
The BBC aired a documentary called "Trump: A Second Chance?" just days before the 2024 U.S. presidential election. In the program, editors combined three short quotes from two different parts of Trump's 2021 speech, delivered nearly an hour apart, and presented them as a single quote in which he told supporters to march with him and "fight like hell." The edit removed a section in which he said he wanted people to protest peacefully.
The BBC later apologized for the edit but denied that it defamed Trump. The controversy led to the resignations of the broadcaster's top executive and its head of news.
Court papers filed last month said the BBC plans to ask the court to dismiss the case, arguing that the court lacks jurisdiction because the program was not shown in Florida and that Trump's lawsuit does not present a valid legal claim.
Before filing that request, the BBC asked the judge to delay the evidence-sharing stage of the case, which could require it to hand over many emails and internal documents related to its Trump coverage.
The judge refused, saying it was too early in the legal process to pause discovery. The BBC responded that it will fight the lawsuit but will not comment further while the case is ongoing.
