The BBC plans to ask a court to throw out US President Donald Trump’s US$10 billion (NZ$17.3 billion) lawsuit against the British broadcaster, court papers show.
Trump filed a 33-page lawsuit in December over the way the BBC edited a speech he gave on January 6, 2021, accusing the BBC of broadcasting a "false, defamatory, deceptive, disparaging, inflammatory, and malicious depiction of President Trump", calling it "a brazen attempt to interfere in and influence" the 2024 US presidential election.
It accused the BBC of "splicing together two entirely separate parts of President Trump’s speech on January 6, 2021" in order to "intentionally misrepresent the meaning of what President Trump said".
The claim, filed in a Florida federal court, seeks US$5 billion (NZ$8.7 billion) in damages for defamation and US$5 billion for unfair trade practices.
The publicly funded BBC apologised to Trump over the edit of the Jan. 6 speech, acknowledging that its edit of the speech "gave the mistaken impression that President Trump had made a direct call for violent action", but rejected his demands for compensation and disagreed there was a basis for a defamation claim.
The broadcaster also argued the documentary where the edited speech was aired did not air in the US and therefore did not defame the US president.
The furor triggered the resignations of the BBC’s top executive and its head of news in November last year.
Papers filed Monday in US District Court in Miami say the BBC will file a motion to dismiss the case on March 17 on the basis that the court lacks jurisdiction and Trump failed to state a claim.
The broadcaster’s lawyers will argue that the BBC did not create, produce or broadcast the documentary in Florida and that Trump’s claim the documentary was available in the US on streaming service BritBox is not true.
They will argue that the US President "will not be able to prove" that the documentary, which aired before the 2024 election but not in the United States, "caused him any cognisable injury".
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