The BBC apologized to President Donald Trump on Thursday for editing part of his Jan. 6, 2021, speech at the Ellipse in Washington D.C., fulfilling one of his three demands to prevent a $1 billion lawsuit over a pre-election documentary.
The British broadcaster said in a report on its airwaves the documentary was an “error in judgment” and that the program — “Trump: A Second Chance?” — would not air on any BBC airwaves. A BBC statement on Thursday said that 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.”
BBC Chair Samir Shah has also sent a letter to the White House “making clear to President Trump that he and the Corporation are sorry for the edit,” the BBC said in its statement.
The White House referred TheWrap to the president’s legal team. A spokesperson for the team did not have an immediate comment.
The BBC documentary came under fire last week after an internal memo, leaked to the Telegraph, found the broadcaster “completely misled” viewers with an edited clip that suggested Trump encouraged supporters outside the Ellipse on Jan. 6, 2021 to riot at the Capitol over the 2020 election results. Trump had urged his supporters to march “peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.”
The memo ignited a wave of controversy in the U.K. and led to the resignations of its director general, Tim Davie, and its head of BBC News, Deborah Turness. Trump attorney Alejandro Brito then sent a letter to the broadcaster on Sunday demanding it retract the documentary, issue an apology and “appropriately compensate” Trump for allegedly causing “reputational and financial harm.” If it did not comply with the demands by 5 p.m. ET on Friday, Trump would sue the outlet for $1 billion.
“These are very dishonest people who tried to step on the scales of a Presidential Election,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on Sunday after the executives’ resignations. “On top of everything else, they are from a Foreign Country, one that many consider our Number One Ally. What a terrible thing for Democracy!”
Shah first apologized Monday for the “error in judgment” over the documentary in an interview with the BBC, but said he had not wanted Davie to resign.
“We were upset by the decision,” Shah said.
