Two of the British Broadcasting Corporation’s (BBC) top executives have stepped down following allegations that the broadcaster’s flagship documentary programme misleadingly edited a speech by former US President Donald Trump delivered before the January 6 Capitol riot.
Director General Tim Davie and BBC News Chief Executive Deborah Turness resigned days after The Daily Telegraph reported on a leaked internal memo suggesting that the BBC’s Panorama documentary, Trump: A Second Chance?, had spliced Trump’s remarks to make it appear that he had explicitly encouraged the attack on the US Capitol on 6 January 2021.
BREAKING: BBC Director General Tim Davie and News CEO Deborah Turness Resign Following Backlash Over Edited Donald Trump Documentary pic.twitter.com/WxHCe7SBBK
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) November 9, 2025
Announcing his resignation, Davie stated that while the BBC continued to perform well overall, recent controversies surrounding BBC News had contributed to his decision to step down. “Like all public organisations, the BBC is not perfect, and we must always be open, transparent and accountable,” he said in a statement posted on the BBC website. “While not being the only reason, the current debate around BBC News has understandably contributed to my decision. Overall, the BBC is delivering well, but there have been some mistakes made, and as director-general I have to take ultimate responsibility.”
The Daily Telegraph Report
According to The Daily Telegraph, concerns were first raised last summer in a memo on editorial impartiality written by Michael Prescott, who had served until June as an independent external adviser to the BBC’s Editorial Standards Committee. The memo, later leaked, alleged that the Panorama documentary broadcast the week before last year’s US election had combined footage from different points in Trump’s speech to suggest that he had urged supporters to march to the Capitol and “fight like hell.”
Prescott said that in reality, the two remarks were made about 50 minutes apart, and that in the original footage, Trump had said supporters should walk to the Capitol to “cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women.”
At the time of the speech, Trump was still disputing the outcome of the 2020 election, in which he lost to President Joe Biden. Prescott also accused the BBC of avoiding coverage of stories that raised difficult questions about transgender rights and claimed that BBC Arabic had provided a platform to a journalist who had made antisemitic comments.
Reactions and Political Fallout
The Daily Telegraph report prompted strong reactions from both sides of the Atlantic. White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt accused the BBC of being “purposefully dishonest” in its depiction of Trump’s speech and the Capitol riot.
Trump also responded, alleging bias among journalists and calling them “very dishonest people who tried to step on the scales of a Presidential Election.”
In the United Kingdom, Culture, Media and Sport Minister Lisa Nandy described the allegations as “incredibly serious.” Speaking to BBC Television, Nandy said that the Panorama edit was one of several concerns about editorial standards at the broadcaster.
“It isn’t just about the Panorama programme, although that is incredibly serious,” she said. “There are a series of very serious allegations made, the most serious of which is that there is systemic bias in the way that difficult issues are reported at the BBC.” Nandy also expressed concern that the BBC’s reporting standards and language varied inconsistently depending on the subject, including issues related to “Israel, Gaza… trans people or on this issue about President Trump.”
Following the resignations, Leavitt posted on X a screenshot of the BBC website announcing the leadership changes, appearing to celebrate the news.
Shot: Chaser: pic.twitter.com/n0U08PnUJb
— Karoline Leavitt (@PressSec) November 9, 2025
The BBC’s Wider Controversies
The latest resignations add to a series of editorial controversies for the BBC this year. Earlier in 2025, the broadcaster issued multiple apologies for “serious flaws” in the making of its documentary Gaza: How to Survive a Warzone, aired in February.
In October, the BBC accepted a sanction from the UK’s media regulator, Ofcom, for a “materially misleading” programme that had used a child narrator later revealed to be the son of a former Hamas deputy agriculture minister.
With over 21,000 employees, the BBC remains one of the world’s largest public service broadcasters, funded primarily through licence fees paid by UK households and supplemented by commercial revenue. The organisation has faced increasing scrutiny in recent years over its impartiality, editorial independence, and global reputation for trustworthiness.
(Source: NDTV)
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