The judge said Mr Trump must be cross-examined by BBC lawyers by December 11 or the case could be dropped.
Published October 22, 2026
A US federal judge has ordered President Donald Trump to take a deposition as part of a $10 billion defamation lawsuit against British broadcaster BBC.
On Thursday, US Magistrate Judge Anjolique Lett ruled that President Trump must answer questions under oath in a meeting with a BBC lawyer.
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Depositions are expected to take place no later than December 11, or President Trump could face sanctions, including dismissal of the case.
President Trump was previously scheduled to take a deposition on October 16, but canceled it citing “matters of national importance.”
Charles Tobin, a lawyer for the BBC, said the president was actually campaigning in Georgia that day.
“He was involved in partisan politics and prioritized that over attending the deposition,” Tobin said.
The BBC lawsuit is one of several he has brought against news organizations over reporting he dislikes or finds unfair.
President Trump is currently embroiled in a new $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the Wall Street Journal, which was previously dismissed and then refiled in May. A separate defamation lawsuit seeks $15 billion in damages from The New York Times and book publisher Penguin Random House.
The series of lawsuits has alarmed press freedom advocates, who say the president frequently uses government pressure and legal threats to shape the press in his favor.
His lawsuit against the BBC focuses on a documentary aired by the BBC titled “Trump: A Second Chance.”
The documentary includes clips of a speech Trump gave on January 6, 2021, when Trump supporters later stormed the U.S. Capitol.
President Trump said a clip of his speech was edited to misleadingly suggest that he encouraged attendees to storm the Capitol, the home of the U.S. Congress. At the time of the riot, lawmakers inside were in the process of certifying Trump’s defeat in the 2020 election.
The British broadcaster has confirmed that the filmmakers have pieced together various parts of President Trump’s January 6 remarks.
The head of the BBC and its head of news both resigned and the BBC issued an apology. However, the network denied Trump’s defamation claims.
President Trump insists he never directed his supporters to use violence to prevent a peaceful transition of power.
But President Trump has long falsely blamed election fraud for his 2020 election loss.
On January 6, 2021, President Trump gathered his supporters on the Ellipse outside the White House and repeated his baseless claims.
During his speech, he encouraged people to “fight like hell” and refused to concede to what he falsely portrayed as an election stolen by “fraud.”
Mr. Trump and his allies oversaw a multifaceted effort to maintain power despite his defeat, including the alleged recruitment of “fake electors” to cast fraudulent electoral votes on Mr. Trump’s behalf.
He later faced federal charges of trying to overturn the 2020 election, but those charges were dropped upon his re-election in 2024.
Separately, a state-level lawsuit in Georgia accuses President Trump of engaging in a criminal conspiracy to subvert the 2020 election. The case was dismissed in November 2025 after Trump’s accuser, Fani Willis, was disqualified and replaced by a new prosecutor.
A Congressional investigation into events around January 6 concluded that the president was reluctant to call on his supporters to resign after they stormed the Capitol.
