Judge Threatens To Sanction Trump After He Backs Out Of Deposition In $10 Billion BBC Case

A federal magistrate judge threatened Friday to levy sanctions against President Donald Trump for failing to "participate" in his own defamation lawsuit against the BBC, after the broadcaster informed the court that Trump had backed out of a planned deposition in the case and suggested he couldn't be interviewed until next year.

Magistrate Judge Enjolique A. Lett issued an order Friday directing Trump to file a response to the BBC regarding his deposition by Oct. 22, noting the court had already "admonished" the president for his "lack of participation" in the case "to no avail."

Failing to "strict[ly]" comply with the court's schedule for discovery in the case, Lett wrote Friday, "will lead to sanctions."

Trump has sued the BBC for $10 billion, claiming the broadcaster allegedly defamed him by "deceptively" editing a video of the president's speech on Jan. 6, 2021 for a 2024 documentary, in order to falsely suggest Trump was trying to incite violence on Jan. 6 and bias viewers against him in the 2024 election.

As part of discovery in the lawsuit—where both sides gather evidence to support their case—the BBC is trying to get a deposition from Trump, which it said in a filing Tuesday was supposed to take place Friday.

After first failing to coordinate with the BBC about the logistics for the deposition, Trump's lawyers told the broadcaster the president wouldn't be able to attend the deposition because of "other matters of national importance," and wouldn't be available to testify until January 2027 at the earliest—despite discovery in the case being scheduled to end in December.

Trump's legal team did not directly respond to the threat of sanctions or the BBC's request for the court to force Trump to be deposed, but alleged in a statement to Forbes that the president's lawsuit "is holding the BBC accountable for its defamation and reckless election interference."

The BBC has asked the court to compel Trump to be deposed in the case in a reasonable timeframe, and Lett agreed Friday to discuss the issue at a hearing on Oct. 22. It remains to be seen if the judge could levy any sanctions against Trump or his attorneys, and what those punishments could look like if so.

The BBC noted in its filing Tuesday that the court "has been required to intervene at every juncture to cajole even the most basic participation in the discovery process out of" Trump, quoting a past case that argued it's "not the court's role, nor that of opposing counsel, to drag a party kicking and screaming through the discovery process," especially when Trump "was the party which filed this lawsuit" in the first place. The president "chose to file this lawsuit and, in doing so, he accepted the obligations of civil litigation," the BBC's attorneys argued to the court.

The debate over Trump's deposition is one of several taking place in the BBC case, as the broadcaster is also seeking testimony from Trump allies like his children Donald Trump Jr. and Ivanka Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner. The BBC told the court in August that it had so far been blocked from serving subpoenas to the president's family members in person because of their Secret Service protection, claiming the subpoenas were necessary because the Trump children and Kushner have "personal knowledge" of Trump's "intention" behind his Jan. 6 speech. The court ruled in October that the broadcaster could instead serve the Trump family through alternate means—like sending a certified letter or contacting their attorneys—paving the way for those depositions to take place. The BBC was less successful in getting a deposition from former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson , who assisted Trump's then-chief of staff Mark Meadows on Jan. 6 and has testified to Congress about the attack on the Capitol. Hutchinson asked the court to throw out her subpoena, and the court agreed , siding with Hutchinson's argument that her testimony would be "irrelevant" and would "subject her to oppression and harassment."

Trump sued the BBC for defamation in December over its 2024 "Panorama" documentary, which aired in the U.K. before the 2024 election, but did not air in the U.S. The documentary quoted the president as telling supporters on Jan. 6, "We're going to walk down to the Capitol... and I'll be there with you. And we fight. We fight like hell." In actuality, 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." He then made the comment to "fight like hell" more than 50 minutes later. The BBC has apologized to the president for the editing job, saying it gave "the mistaken impression that President Trump had made a direct call for violent action," but has strongly denied it was defamatory. While Trump initially argued the BBC's editing job had hurt his businesses, the lawsuit now only argues that it harmed his personal reputation, as the court allowed the president to narrow his lawsuit after the BBC asked Trump to turn over significant financial information about his assets and the value of his businesses.