Trump threatens BBC with $1 billion lawsuit for editing speech in movie
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President of the United States Donald Trump has threatened the British Broadcasting Corporation BBC with a $1 billion lawsuit for editing his speech in a documentary. This was reported by NBC News citing a spokesperson for the US president's legal team.

"The BBC defamed President Trump by intentionally and fraudulently editing its documentary to try to interfere in the presidential election," a representative of the legal team said.

"President Trump will continue to hold accountable those who spread lies, deception and fake news," he added.

In a letter to the corporation, Trump's legal team requires from the BBC to "immediately withdraw" the Panorama program by November 14, calling it "false and defamatory."

BBC Director General Tim Davies and Director General of News Deborah Turness resigned the night before after a memo criticizing the 2024 Panorama program about the US president was leaked.

The situation with the documentary became known this summer when the Telegraph newspaper published a note by Michael Prescott, former independent adviser to the BBC's Editorial Standards Committee.

Prescott's memo says the program merged two parts of Trump's speech, giving the impression that he openly encouraged riots on Capitol Hill in January 2021.

In his speech, Trump said: "We will go to the Capitol and cheer on our brave senators and congressmen." His words were quoted in the program as follows: "We will go to the Capitol... and I will go with you. And we will fight. We will fight with all our might".

In Trump's original speech, the two parts of this statement were separated by a gap of more than 50 minutes, the BBC notes. The corporation said the program was created for it by an independent contractor.

The resigning BBC executives admitted that mistakes had been made, but said they were not intentional and denied accusations of bias against BBC News as an organization.