Ben Wright and
Chris Graham
EPAThe ‘s outgoing director general Tim Davie will address staff on Tuesday morning after Donald Trump threatened to sue the corporation for $1bn (£760m) over a Panorama programme.
It follows a leaked internal memo which said the programme had misled viewers by splicing together two parts of the US president’s 6 January 2021 speech, making it appear as if he had explicitly encouraged the Capitol Hill riot.
Trump threatened to take legal action if the did not make a “full and fair retraction” of the programme by Friday. The has said it will reply in due course.
Arriving at the ‘s London headquarters on Tuesday, Davie said he was “very proud of the journalists in this building” doing “incredibly important” work.
“Personally, I’m here to lead and support them,” he told reporters gathered outside.
Davie’s staff call will take place mid-morning.
He said on Sunday the “current debate” around the corporation was not the only reason for his decision to step down, but “understandably contributed” to it.
“Overall the is delivering well, but there have been some mistakes made and as director general I have to take ultimate responsibility.”
Outgoing News CEO Deborah Turness, who resigned alongside Davie, insisted on Monday the corporation was not “institutionally biased”.
Separately, chair Samir Shah has said the would like to apologise for the edit, which he called an “error of judgement” which gave the impression of a “direct call for violent action”.
The issue is expected to be raised in the Commons later in the day in a private session of the Culture, Media and Sport (CMS) committee. Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy is also expected to make a statement in the Commons.
Trump’s legal team wrote to the on Sunday threatening to take action over the “false, defamatory, disparaging, misleading, and inflammatory statements”.
It calls for an apology and for the to “appropriately compensate” the president.
Trump’s attorney Alejandro Brito also accused the of defamation under Florida law.
The programme, which was first broadcast on 24 October 2024, is not available to watch on iPlayer – which the noted on Monday was because it was “over a year old”. Some current affairs programmes including Panorama are only kept on the service for 365 days.
In his speech on 6 January 2021, Trump said: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol, and we’re going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women.”
In the Panorama programme, he was shown saying: “We’re going to walk down to the Capitol… and I’ll be there with you. And we fight. We fight like hell.”
The two sections that were stitched together were originally more than 50 minutes apart.
Media lawyer Mark Stephens said it would be difficult for Trump to bring the case in the US, since his team would need to prove the programme had been shown there.
“Panorama wasn’t broadcast in the USA, and iPlayer isn’t available… so it’s not clear that any US court would have jurisdiction to hear the claim,” he told Breakfast.
Stephens added that he did not feel this was “the particular legal hill [Trump] wants to die on,” should it go to court.
“Every damning quote that he’s ever uttered is going to be played back to him and picked over – not great PR.”
George Freeman, a former assistant general counsel for The New York Times, described numbers cited in legal complaints in the US – such as the $1bn in Trump’s – as “totally meaningless” and “empty”.
“It’s so meaningless that when I was at the New York Times, we had a policy that the paper wouldn’t print the amount sued for,” he told the ‘s World Tonight programme.
He explained that in the US, Trump’s team would need to prove a “gross distortion” of his meaning, that the edit harmed his reputation, and that it “was done intentionally to create a different meaning”.
The unprecedented joint resignations at the came after growing pressure following the publication of the leaked internal memo last week by the Telegraph newspaper, which highlighted the Panorama edit which was first broadcast in October 2024.
Written by a former independent external adviser to the broadcaster’s editorial standards committee, Michael Prescott, the memo also expressed concerns about other issues.
It also raised concerns over the ‘s Gaza coverage, particularly by Arabic, anti-Trump and anti-Israel bias and one-sided transgender reporting – among other “troubling matters”.
The chair, responding to the concerns for the first time on Monday, said it was “simply not true” the memo had uncovered issues the had “sought to bury” – nor was it correct to suggest the had done nothing to tackle concerns raised in the memo.
A spokesman for Sir Keir Starmer said on Monday the prime minister did not believe the was “institutionally biased”.
No 10 also denied the was “corrupt” – a word Trump used to describe some of its journalists over the Panorama programme.
Meanwhile, Sir Robbie Gibb, a former senior editor at the who was director of communications for Theresa May in Downing Street, has faced calls to be removed from the board.
Writing in the Guardian, Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey said “rightwing populists have been attacking the for years”.
To ensure the ‘s independence and impartiality, Sir Robbie should have no role in appointing the new director general, he wrote.
“The government should remove him from the board immediately – and end the practice of political appointments, which so badly undermines the , altogether,” he said.
Sir Robbie has not responded.
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said the focus should be on the mistakes made “rather than chasing people because of their political opinions”.
Former Conservative MP Sir Jacob Rees-Mogg told the ‘s Newsnight programme that the government should stay out of the latest controversy “because the wants to maintain its independence from the government”.
Asked about the US president’s threat of legal action, he said: “I would have thought it would be sensible for the to settle with Donald Trump… It won’t be a billion, it will be some lesser amount.”
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, who claimed the “has been institutionally biased for decades”, said he spoke with Trump on Friday, telling a London news conference: “He just said to me: ‘Is this how you treat your best ally?'”.