Mr Trump’s legal team has accused the BBC of using “false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory statements”.
BBC Chair Samir Shah has apologised for an “error of judgment” over the way the speech was edited, while director-general, Tim Davie, and CEO of BBC News, Deborah Turness, have both announced their resignations.
But this is not the first time Mr Trump has taken on the media – and is in fact the latest in a recent spate of legal battles with the press.
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BBC will consider settling with Trump says legal correspondent
Trump vs CNN
If past examples are anything to go by, Mr Trump’s legal threat is not an empty one.
He previously filed a $475m (£360m) defamation suit against CNN, alleging it had compared him to Adolf Hitler.
It came after CNN referred to Mr Trump’s unfounded claims that the 2020 election was stolen from him as the “Big Lie” – an expression also used by Hitler in Mein Kampf.
But the case was thrown out after US district judge Raag Singhal ruled that the term “does not give rise to a plausible inference that Trump advocates the persecution and genocide of Jews”.
Image: Letter from Alejandro Brito, one of Mr. Trump’s lawyers who is based in Florida, to the BBC
Election campaign lawsuit
His election campaign in 2020 also sued the New York Times and the Washington Post over opinion pieces alleging ties between with Russia.
These cases were dismissed in 2021 and 2023, respectively.
Yet, Mr Trump has had more success in recent years.
ABC settlement
In 2024, Trump sued American broadcaster ABC and its news host George Stephanopoulos, after the anchor falsely referred to the president being found “liable for rape” in an interview.
Image: Donald Trump on stage with George Stephanopoulos. Pic: Reuters
In the civil case in question, he was actually found liable for sexual abuse and defamation – a verdict which Trump is appealing.
Given the high bar for proving defamation against public figures, experts were sceptical that he could win the lawsuit.
George Freeman, executive director of the Media Law Resource Center told CBS at the time: “I don’t know of any president who successfully sued a media company for defamation.”
Yet ABC, which is owned by Disney, agreed to settle, paying $15m (£11.4m) to Trump for his future presidential library, and a further $1m (£760,000) towards his legal fees.
Battle with CBS
In another lawsuit, the president demanded $20bn (£15.2bn) from CBS over an interview with his election rival Kamala Harris broadcast on 60 Minutes.
Image: Results pour in on election night during an event for Kamala Harris at Howard University, Washington. Photo: AP
His team accused the broadcaster of “partisan and unlawful acts of election and voter interference” with its editing of the interview, saying it intended to “mislead the public and attempt to tip the scales” in the contest.
First Amendment attorney Charles Tobin of the law firm Ballard Spahr told CNN at the time: “This is a frivolous and dangerous attempt by a politician to control the news media.”
Yet they too settled out of court, with CBS’ parent company, Paramount Global, paying $16m (£12.1m) to end the legal dispute – again towards Trump’s future presidential library.
Trump vs Meta
Image: Pic: REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann
Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, also settled with the president to the tune of $25m (£19m).
That lawsuit came after he sued over the suspension of his accounts in the wake of the 6 January riots.
Why the recent spate?
While Mr Trump has made several threats to media organisations in recent years, it is not the first time he has done so.
According to Columbia Journalism Review, he threatened to sue a journalist at New York’s Village Voice as far back as 1979, and actually sued the Chicago Tribune in 1984.
That 1984 lawsuit, which came after Mr Trump took umbrage at a column by the paper’s award-winning architecture columnist criticising his plans for a huge tower block in New York City, was thrown out as an opinion by a judge.
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However, the number of lawsuits, and the size of his compensation demands, have increased of late. So what has changed?
“As president, Trump’s leverage has increased exponentially,” wrote media reporter Paul Farhi in Vanity Fair.
“It’s no coincidence that Disney and Meta have settled since Election Day, and Paramount has come to the table.”
Now that he’s turning his ire on the BBC, what will the outcome be?
Mr Freeman called his threat to the broadcaster “totally meaningless”, noting that he “has a long record of unsuccessful libel suits” intended to “threaten and scare media he doesn’t like”.
Can the BBC rely on that assessment?
With a deadline set for Friday, 10pm UK time, we may be about to find out.
President Trump’s “America First” agenda has been spelt out in a new White House National Security Strategy that should make stark reading for allies and foes of the United States alike.
The new 33-page document outlines an upending of American foreign policy objectives and priorities which have stood largely unchanged through different administrations stretching back decades.
The document says American strategy went “astray” over many years. It seeks to reframe America’s strategic interests as being far narrower now than at any time in its modern history.
Among the key points, the document says:
• Europe faces “civilizational erasure” and could be “unrecognisable in 20 years or less”
• “Certain NATO members will become majority non-European” within a few decades
• America will “shift away” from the “burden” of the Middle East seeing it now as a “source and destination of international investment”
• In the Western hemisphere, America should pursue a policy of “enlist and expand… restoring American pre-eminence”
• In Africa, American policy focus should be on trade not “providing and spreading liberal ideology”
Image: America will ‘shift away’ from the ‘burden’ of the Middle East. Pic: Reuters
In black-and-white, the text articulates a dramatic strategic shift which has been playing out at lightning speed over the past year.
The document underlines the end of the concept of America as an arbiter of the democratic rules-based order.
“American foreign policy elites convinced themselves that permanent American domination of the entire world was in the best interests of our country. Yet the affairs of other countries are our concern only if their activities directly threaten our interests,” the paper says.
Every US administration publishes at least one National Security Strategy during a presidential term.
The focus of this one is starkly different from that published by President Biden in 2022.
It’s also notably different from the document which President Trump published during his first term. His 2017 paper cast the world as a contest between “repressive regimes” and “free societies”.
Image: Trump doesn’t want the US to be the arbiter of the democratic rules-based order. Pic: Reuters
This new one places the necessity to do trade above the imposition of values.
“We seek good relations and peaceful commercial relations with the nations of the world without imposing on them democratic or other social change that differs widely from their traditions and histories.”
Mass migration and Europe
The new document is highly critical of mass migration.
It warns that uncontrolled migration is destroying the concept of nation states which could impact America’s strategic alliances and the countries it counts as reliable allies.
The paper is particularly critical of Europe, of the European Union as a concept and of individual European nations.
“Should present trends continue, the continent will be unrecognizable in 20 years or less,” the paper says.
It continues: “As such, it is far from obvious whether certain European countries will have economies and militaries strong enough to remain reliable allies.
“Many of these nations are currently doubling down on their present path. We want Europe to remain European, to regain its civilizational self-confidence, and to abandon its failed focus on regulatory suffocation.”
Image: Trump will seek to support ‘patriotic European parties’. Pic: AP
The document’s language around the politics of governing parties across Europe is particularly stark.
Regarding Ukraine, the document says: “The Trump Administration finds itself at odds with European officials who hold unrealistic expectations for the war perched in unstable minority governments, many of which trample on basic principles of democracy to suppress opposition.
“A large European majority wants peace, yet that desire is not translated into policy, in large measure because of those government’s subversion of democratic processes.”
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The document outlines how his administration will seek to support “patriotic European parties”.
This is entirely in line with President Trump’s rhetoric but still represents a major departure from the longstanding principle of not interfering in the politics of allies.
It says: “American diplomacy should continue to stand up for genuine democracy, freedom of expression, and unapologetic celebrations of European nations’ individual character and history.
“America encourages its political allies in Europe to promote this revival of spirit, and the growing influence of patriotic European parties indeed gives cause for great optimism.”
Image: Trump has at times had a fiery relationship with Ukraine’s President Zelenskyy. Pic: Reuters
Ukraine and Russia
On European-Russia relations, the document raises the prospect of war but curiously does not presume that such a conflict would involve America.
“Managing European relations with Russia will require significant US diplomatic engagement, both to reestablish conditions of strategic stability across the Eurasian landmass, and to mitigate the risk of conflict between Russia and European states.”
By contrast, President Biden’s National Security Strategy, published in 2022, underlined repeatedly the “iron-clad” commitment the United States had to Europe’s security.
Chinese risk and opportunity
The document presents Asia and the Indo-Pacific region as a source of opportunity for strategic and economic cooperation.
Image: Maintaining US military strength over China is also outlined. Pic: Reuters
“President Trump is building alliances and strengthening partnerships in the Indo-Pacific that will be the bedrock of security and prosperity long into the future…”
And specifically on China, the paper presents a goal of “economic vitality” achieved through a balanced economic relationship between the two countries combined with an “ongoing focus on deterrence to prevent war”.
Deterrence would be achieved, it outlines, by maintaining preeminent military strength over China.
It says: “This combined approach can become a virtuous cycle as strong American deterrence opens up space for more disciplined economic action, while more disciplined economic action leads to greater American resources to sustain deterrence in the long term.”
Hemispheres of influence
In line with President Trump’s focus on spheres of influence, particular focus is given to the western hemisphere.
There are clear references to the impact of drugs from south and central America into the US and more subtle references to control of the arctic.
“The United States will reassert and enforce the Monroe Doctrine to restore American pre-eminence in the Western Hemisphere, and to protect our homeland and our access to key geographies throughout the region,” the paper says.
It continues: “We will deny non-Hemispheric competitors the ability to position forces or other threatening capabilities, or to own or control strategically vital assets, in our hemisphere.”
US President Donald Trump has been awarded FIFA’s new peace prize at the draw for next year’s World Cup.
FIFA President Gianni Infantino presented Mr Trump with a large golden trophy – formed of hands holding the earth – and a gold medal, which he wore around his neck.
The certificate, which Mr Infantino handed over at Washington DC’s Kennedy Center on Friday, recognises the US president for his actions to “promote peace and unity around the world”.
World football’s governing body, which announced the annual award last month, said it would be given to “individuals who have taken exceptional and extraordinary actions for peace”.
Mr Trump said it was “truly one of the greatest honours of my life”.
He said: “We saved millions and millions of lives. The Congo is an example – over 10 million people killed. It was heading for another 10 million very quickly.”
Image: US President Donald Trump. Pics: Reuters
He also pointed to India and Pakistan, saying, “so many wars that we were able to end, in some cases a little before they started”.
Ahead of the draw, Mr Trump told reporters he did not care about the prize, but noted that he had “settled eight wars” in nearly 11 months in office.
The United States, along with Canada and Mexico, will host the tournament in 2026.
Mr Infantino, who has built up a strong relationship with the US president, backed him for the Nobel Peace Prize earlier this year.
“This is what we want from a leader – a leader that cares about the people,” Mr Infantino said of Mr Trump.
The FIFA leader said to Mr Trump, “this is your prize, this is your peace prize”.
Image: US President Donald Trump and FIFA President Gianni Infantino. Pic: Reuters
Mr Trump thanked his family, including his wife, first lady Melania Trump, and praised the leaders of the other two host nations – Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum – in his brief remarks.
Mr Infantino has often spoken about football as a unifier for the world, but the prize is a departure from the federation’s traditional focus on sport.
FIFA has described the prize as one that rewards “individuals who have taken exceptional and extraordinary actions for peace, and by doing so have united people across the world”.
The award comes during a week where Mr Trump’s administration has been under scrutiny for lethal strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean and as Mr Trump hardens his rhetoric against immigrants.
The Nobel Peace Prize this year was eventually awarded to Venezuelan opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, who said shortly after receiving the prize that she was dedicating it in part to Mr Trump for “his decisive support of our cause”.
Netflix has agreed a $72bn (£54bn) deal to secure Warner Bros Discovery’s film and TV studios and supercharge its library through rights to top franchises including Harry Potter and Game Of Thrones.
It had been reported that the US streaming giant was in exclusive talks over the deal following a bidding war for the assets.
Paramount Skydance and Comcast, the ultimate owner of Sky News, were the rival suitors for the bulk of WBD that also includes HBO, the HBO Max streaming platform and DC Studios.
While Netflix has agreed a $27.75 per share price with WBD, which equates to the $72bn purchase figure, the deal gives the assets a total value of $82.7bn.
It will see WBD come under Netflix ownership once its remaining Discovery Global division, mostly legacy cable networks including CNN and the TNT sports channels, is separated.
However, the agreement is set to attract scrutiny from competition regulators, particularly in the United States and Europe.
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Both WBD and Netflix do not see the prospect of the deal being completed until late 2026 or 2027.
The main stumbling block is likely to be the fact that Netflix, which has hits including Stranger Things and Squid Game, is already the world’s biggest streaming service.
Image: Stranger Things is one of Netflix’s biggest hits. Pic: Netflix
Further drama could come in the form of a complaint by Paramount, which had previously made a bid for the whole company.
CNBC reported this week that Paramount had claimed the auction process was biased in favour of Netflix.
Entertainment news provider Variety has also reported that major studios fear an institutional crisis for Hollywood unless the move is blocked.
Ted Sarandos, the co-chief executive of Netflix, said: “By combining Warner Bros’ incredible library of shows and movies – from timeless classics like Casablanca and Citizen Kane to modern favourites like Harry Potter and Friends – with our culture-defining titles like Stranger Things, KPop Demon Hunters and Squid Game, we’ll be able to do that even better.
“Together, we can give audiences more of what they love and help define the next century of storytelling.”
Netflix shares were trading down more than 3% in pre-market deals but recovered much of that loss when Wall Street opened. Those for WBD were up by more than 2%.
David O’Hara, managing director at the advisory firm MKI Global Partners, said of the proposed deal: “The 12-18 month timeline signals a long antitrust review, but despite the overlap between Netflix and HBO Max, there is a path to approval through possible HBO divestment.
“Netflix would not accept a $5.8bn break fee if it didn’t see at least a small chance of the deal closing.”