Donald Trump has said he will sue the BBC for between $1bn and $5bn over the editing of his speech on Panorama.

The US president confirmed he would be taking legal action against the broadcaster while on Air Force One overnight on Saturday.

“We’ll sue them. We’ll sue them for anywhere between a billion (£792m) and five billion dollars (£3.79bn), probably sometime next week,” he told reporters.

“We have to do it, they’ve even admitted that they cheated. Not that they couldn’t have not done that. They cheated. They changed the words coming out of my mouth.”

Mr Trump then told reporters he would discuss the matter with Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer over the weekend, and claimed “the people of the UK are very angry about what happened… because it shows the BBC is fake news”.

The Daily Telegraph reported earlier this month that an internal memo raised concerns about the BBC’s editing of a speech made by Mr Trump on 6 January 2021, just before a mob rioted at the US Capitol building, on its flagship late-night news programme.

The concerns regard clips spliced together from sections of the president’s speech to make it appear he told supporters he was going to walk to the US Capitol with them to “fight like hell” in the documentary Trump: A Second Chance?, which was broadcast by the BBC the week before last year’s US election.

Following a backlash, both BBC director-general Tim Davie and BBC News chief executive Deborah Turness resigned from their roles.

‘No basis for defamation claim’

On Thursday, the broadcaster officially apologised to the president and added that it was an “error of judgement” and the programme will “not be broadcast again in this form on any BBC platforms”.

A spokesperson said that “the BBC sincerely regrets the manner in which the video clip was edited,” but they also added that “we strongly disagree there is a basis for a defamation claim”.

Earlier this week, Mr Trump’s lawyers threatened to sue the BBC for $1bn unless it apologised, retracted the clip, and compensated him.

Legal challenges

But legal experts have said that Mr Trump would face challenges taking the case to court in the UK or the US.

The deadline to bring the case to UK courts, where defamation damages rarely exceed £100,000 ($132,000), has already expired because the documentary aired in October 2024, which is more than one year.

Also because the documentary was not shown in the US, it would be hard to show that Americans thought less of the president because of a programme they could not watch.

Read more from Sky News:
Key findings in 20,000 pages of documents in the Epstein files
Banksy art theft lands burglar with 13-month prison sentence

Newsnight allegations

The BBC has said it was looking into fresh allegations, published in The Telegraph, that its Newsnight show also selectively edited footage of the same speech in a report broadcast in June 2022.

A BBC spokesperson said: “The BBC holds itself to the highest editorial standards. This matter has been brought to our attention and we are now looking into it.”

This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly.

Please refresh the page for the latest version.

You can receive breaking news alerts on a smartphone or tablet via the Sky News app. You can also follow us on WhatsApp and subscribe to our YouTube channel to keep up with the latest news.

Blue Origin has launched its huge New Glenn rocket with two spacecraft on board destined for Mars, as the firm makes a major step forward in its race against Elon Musk’s SpaceX.

Crowds cheered at Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station as they watched liftoff, which had been stalled for four days by bad weather, and then on Thursday suffered two further delays.

Blue Origin latest: Successful launch after last-minute delay

On board were two identical Mars orbiters, named Escapade, which are now heading to the Red Planet and due to arrive in 2027.

But the firm’s big success was the recovery of the rocket’s reusable first-stage booster, a critical development in the space race with SpaceX. Mr Musk posted his congratulations on X.

It is only the second flight for this new type of rocket, from the company owned by Amazon tycoon, Jeff Bezos.

The rocket headed out over the Atlantic, where it split into its two stages.

The inaugural test flight in January delivered a prototype satellite into orbit, but failed to land the booster stage.

Relief after booster recovery

This time, staff cheered wildly as the booster landed upright on its platform 375 miles (600km) offshore in the Atlantic Ocean. The company had never managed the feat before with a rocket so large.

The recovery of the booster is an essential step to recycle and slash costs. The feat has already been achieved with such large rockets by SpaceX.

Blue Origin had achieved this with its much smaller models, but if it wants to consistently run science-scale missions for NASA this is an important step.

The rocket, named after American astronaut John Glenn, weighs roughly the same as 20 trucks. It can put into space a payload of 45 metric tonnes.

At 98m tall and 7m wide, it is larger than most rockets, but not as big as SpaceX’s Starship nor the Saturn Vs which sent humans to the moon.

Blue and Gold to visit Red Planet

Meanwhile, NASA’s Escapade (Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers) mission comprises two identical orbiting spacecraft named Blue and Gold.

The probes intend to study how solar wind interacts with Mars’s magnetic environment and how this impacts the planet’s atmospheric escape.

Read more from Sky News:
Tourists visit the edge of space
Musk ally to lead NASA
NASA’s first woman commander

This matters because it will help scientists understand Mars’s climate and protect future crews intending to reach the Red Planet.

This was Blue Origin’s third attempt to launch, with the first on Sunday scrapped because of clouds and the threat of lightning strikes.

Wednesday’s attempt was also postponed as a powerful “cannibal storm” hit Earth.

The wife of British journalist Sami Hamdi, who was held for more than a fortnight by US immigration, has issued a stark warning to football fans travelling to the 2026 World Cup about the risk of being detained.

Mr Hamdi, who returned to the UK on Thursday, was initially detained at San Francisco International Airport on 26 October.

US officials revoked his visa without warning while on a speaking tour, during which he criticised Israel’s actions in Gaza.

US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) said the tour was cancelled due to security rules and that he was in the country illegally.

Sitting alongside him in an interview for Sky’s The World With Yalda Hakim, Soumaya Hamdi explained her concerns about British people travelling to the US.

“I would say to British citizens who value their freedom of speech to be very careful, because you got the World Cup in the United States coming up next year.

“If this could happen to Sami on a valid visa, a British citizen, a registered journalist, then it could very well happen again.”

Ms Hamdi added she was not happy about how the UK government had handled their case.

“The assistance that we received from the British government… was really very disappointing.

“I think this is really very concerning that the government is not taking more serious action with regards to our closest ally.”

Speaking about his arrest, Mr Hamdi said it had been “quite an aggressive experience”.

“They escorted me outside of the airport, there was this black car, the kind of things you see in the movies,” he said.

“When I asked them ‘Can I call my family to let them know I’m OK?’, a lady from behind grabs me, pushes me on the car, and says, ‘All right, that’s enough. You’re under arrest’.”

Read more from Sky News:
New arrest over alleged Hamas plot
Fears about ceasefire in Sudan
British man returns following ICE detention

He added that, while in detention, he felt there was an attempt to wear him down by restricting access to justice.

“You felt, like, with ICE, it’s a battle of wills. Based on the merits of the case, they can’t actually win, but what they do is they keep delaying you and delaying until you’re just desperate to go home.”

Mr Hamdi, who is Muslim and lives in London, insisted he had complied with all visa conditions and alleged the move was linked to his advocacy for Gaza.

According to Mr Hamdi’s legal team, he accepted an offer to leave the US voluntarily after being charged with visa overstay.

His family announced on Monday the US government had agreed to free him and confirmed on Thursday morning he was on a flight home.

Discussing his treatment while in detention, Mr Hamdi said he noticed a distinct change when news outlets like Sky News became aware of his case.

“They throw you in a cell, you sleep in the foot cuffs. They kept me there with 24 hours until my legs were swollen. When I told the guards, ‘Look, my legs are swollen, visibly swollen’, the guards simply ignored it.

“They only started treating me better when everybody at Sky News and the other media started raising their voices.”

The Trump administration has pursued a sweeping immigration crackdown this year, revoking visas for people accused of supporting terrorism and deporting foreign nationals who have voiced support for Palestinians.

After Mr Hamdi’s arrest, a spokeswoman for the US Department of Homeland Security said his visa had been revoked as “those who support terrorism and undermine American national security will not be allowed to work or visit this country”.

But he told Sky News he strongly disputed the reason for his detention. “On the charge sheet… there was no mention of anything related to terrorism or anything related to what they were saying online,” he said.

“They knew no evidence existed of any of the accusations they were making. And in the end, the deal was about face-saving. I was happy to go home.

“Of course, they get to say that Sami Hamdi ended up leaving America, the case gets closed, and it worked out for both of us.”