Donald Trump's legal letter to the BBC warning of 'overwhelming financial and reputational harm' - READ IN FULL

Re: Demand to Retract False And Defamatory StatementsAbout The President of the United States of America

Dear All:

This law firm serves as litigation counsel for President Donald J. Trump (hereinafter referred to as “President Trump”). Please direct all future correspondence relating to this matter to my attention. This correspondence serves as a demand under Florida Statute § 770.011 that you immediately retract the false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory statements made about President Trump, which were published in a Panorama documentary that was fabricated and aired by the BBC. Failure to comply will leave President Trump with no choice but to pursue any and all legal rights and remedies available to recover damages for the overwhelming financial and reputational harm that the BBC has caused him to suffer, with all rights and remedies being expressly reserved by President Trump.

In the Panorama documentary, titled “Trump: A Second Chance,”2 which was first broadcast on October 28, 2024—a week before the 2024 United States presidential election—the BBC intentionally sought to completely mislead its viewers by splicing together three separate parts of President Trump’s speech to supporters on January 6, 2021. The documentary showed President Trump telling supporters: “We’re gonna walk down to the Capitol and I’ll be there with you and we fight. We fight like hell and if you don’t fight like hell, you’re not going to have a country anymore.” This fabricated depiction of President Trump was false and defamatory given that President Trump’s actual and full remarks were: “We’re going to walk down, and I’ll be there with you, we’re going to walk down, we’re going to walk down any one of you but I think right here, we’re going to walk down to the Capitol and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressman and women.” Moreover, the BBC edited out President Trump saying, “I know that everyone here will soon be marching over to the Capitol building to peacefully and patriotically make your voices heard.” Thus, as set forth in an internal whistleblower memorandum, the BBC’s segment maliciously made it appear that President Trump “[said] things [he] never actually said,” by editing together footage from the start of the speech with a separate quote early an hour later.

Due to their salacious nature, the fabricated statements that were aired by the BBC have been widely disseminated throughout various digital mediums, which have reached tens of millions of people worldwide. Consequently, the BBC has caused President Trump to suffer overwhelming financial and reputational harm.

A. Applicable law.

Words are defamatory under Florida law when “they tend to subject one to hatred, distrust, ridicule, contempt or disgrace or tend to injure one in one's business or profession.” Johnston v. Borders, 36 F.4th 1254, 1275 (11th Cir. 2022) (quoting Am. Airlines, Inc. v. Geddes, 960 So. 2d 830, 833 (Fla. 3d DCA 2007) (citation and quotation marks omitted)). Statements are defamatory if “the defendant juxtaposes a series of facts so as to imply a defamatory connection between them, or creates a defamatory implication by omitting facts.” Johnston v. Borders, 36 F.4th 1254, 1275 (11th Cir. 2022) (quoting Jews for Jesus, 997 So. 2d at 1108). Further, “where the speaker or writer neglects to provide the audience with an adequate factual foundation prior to engaging in the offending discourse, liability may arise.” See Zambrano v. Devanesan, 484 So. 2d 603, 607 (Fla. 4th DCA 1986).

Even if the BBC attempts to whitewash its conduct as simply an expression of its opinions, Florida law makes clear that such a defense will not absolve its liability. See Dershowitz v. Cable News Network, Inc., 541 F. Supp. 3d 1354, 1362 (S.D. Fla. 2021); see also Milkovich v. Lorain Journal Co., 497 U.S. 1, 18-19 (1990) (“Even if the speaker states the facts upon which he bases his opinion, if those facts are either incorrect or incomplete, or if his assessment of them is erroneous, the statement may still imply a false assertion of fact. Simply couching such statements in terms of opinion does not dispel these implications.”) (emphasis added); see also Eastern Air Lines, Inc. v. Gellert, 438 So. 2d 923, 927 (Fla. 3d DCA 1983) (“[A] statement that although ostensibly in the form of an opinion ‘implies the allegation of undisclosed defamatory facts as the basis for the opinion’ is actionable.”) (emphasis added).

Consequently, the BBC lacks any viable defense to the overwhelming reputational and financial harm it has caused President Trump to suffer.

B. Demand.

The above-referenced false, defamatory, malicious, disparaging, and inflammatory statements were published to deliberately denigrate President Trump. The timing of the fabricated documentary is evident. The BBC’s reckless disregard for the truth underscores the actual malice behind the decision to publish the wrongful content, given the plain falsity of the statements. Accordingly, President Trump hereby demands that you: (1) immediately issue a full and fair retraction of the documentary and any and all other false, defamatory, disparaging, misleading, and inflammatory statements about President Trump in as conspicuous a manner as they were originally published; (2) immediately issue an apology for the false, defamatory, disparaging, misleading, and inflammatory statements about President Trump; and (3) appropriately compensate President Trump for the harm caused.

Moreover, please allow this letter to serve as notice to you, to your affiliated entities, subsidiaries, to all of their employees, and any other person acting on behalf of or in concert with the BBC, to preserve any and all evidence related in any way to the above-mentioned malicious, false, and defamatory statements the BBC published, and any other statements that the BBC has published regarding President Trump. By way of this letter, the BBC is hereby directed not to destroy, conceal, or alter any paper or electronic files, physical evidence, and/or other data relating in any way, no matter how remote, to your false claims regarding President Trump, and/or the circumstances leading to their dissemination, including, but not limited to: (1) all communications between you and any third party in any way related to your wrongful claims regarding President Trump; (2) all sources for your false claims regarding President Trump; (3) any and all documents and data referring to, reflecting, or relating to communications between you and any such third-parties or sources regarding your false claims regarding President Trump; and (4) any and all documents in any way related to your false claims regarding President Trump. This includes any information alleged to be protected by Florida Statute § 90.5015. Monarch Air Group, LLC v. Journalism Dev. Network, Inc., No. 23-CV-61256, 2025 WL 445491, at *1 (S.D. Fla. Feb. 10, 2025) (interpreting Fla. Stat. § 90.5015 and explaining that the Eleventh Circuit “recognizes a qualified privilege for journalists, allowing them to resist compelled disclosure of their professional news gathering efforts. This privilege shields reporters in both criminal and civil proceedings.”) (quoting United States v. Capers, 708 F.3d 1286, 1303 (11th Cir. 2013)).

I understand that many records and files are maintained electronically. However, this letter specifically requests that all paper and hard copy originals be maintained and preserved in their original format. By the same token, electronic documents and the storage media on which they reside may contain relevant, discoverable information beyond that which may be found in printed documents. Therefore, even where a paper copy exists and has been preserved, please preserve and maintain all electronically stored documents in their original native format, including all metadata. This preservation demand specifically encompasses any and all electronic documents, including but not limited to, all word-processed files, emails, spreadsheets, all databases, log files, and any other electronically stored and/or generated documents or files.

If the BBC does not comply with the above by November 14, 2025, at 5:00 p.m. EST, President Trump will be left with no alternative but to enforce his legal and equitable rights, all of which are expressly reserved and are not waived, including by filing legal action for no less than $1,000,000,000 (One Billion Dollars) in damages. The BBC is on notice.

PLEASE GOVERN YOURSELF ACCORDINGLY.

Very truly yours,

/s/ Alejandro Brito

ALEJANDRO BRITO