Federal judge allows Trump’s $10bn defamation lawsuit against BBC to proceed

The Trump-appointed Florida district court judge ruled on Tuesday that the lawsuit, which stems from the BBC's Panorama documentary called Trump: A Second Chance, can proceed. The documentary spliced together comments made by Trump that were nearly 55 minutes apart, an action the BBC has apologized for.

Judge's Ruling

Judge Kuntz wrote that "accepting the allegations in the complaint as true, the Court finds Trump plausibly pled damages where Trump alleges a defamatory documentary released toward the election caused reputational harm." He noted that "it would be difficult for the Court to accept a different framing without completely negating the significance and fragility of political elections."

The judge was not persuaded by the BBC's explanation that the editing was ordinary condensation of a seventy-minute speech into twelve seconds. "Editing is often required," he wrote, but given the time disparity between the two statements, the distance itself tends toward a plausible inference that BBC knew or should have known that the segment they were creating would not and could not have been a truthful statement.

Next Steps

While the judge determined that Trump had "sufficiently pleaded" that the BBC acted with actual malice, the legal standard for a public figure to win a defamation case, he will have to actually prove they did so at trial. The judge also dismissed Trump's claim that the BBC violated Florida's Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act.

Trump heralded the ruling on Truth Social, calling it a "huge victory" and stating "We will continue fighting against, and defeating, all of those who try to deceive the American People!" The BBC responded with a statement saying they are "surprised by this decision but respect the Court's authority and note the case will now proceed to the next stage."

In late October, a Florida magistrate judge ruled that Trump will have to sit for a deposition conducted by lawyers for the BBC by December 11 or else he could be hit with sanctions. The judge also determined that Trump will have to prove that he suffered "actual damages" from the airing of the documentary, which was not broadcast in Florida.