A federal judge has ordered President Trump to sit for a deposition by December 11 with attorneys for the British Broadcasting Corporation, which he is suing for $10 billion for defamation.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Enjoliqué Lett ruled Thursday that Trump can’t delay answering questions from the BBC’s lawyers, the Associated Press reports. The president had canceled a planned October 16 deposition based on a “matter of national importance.” According to the BBC’s attorneys, Trump was in fact campaigning in Georgia for the midterms that day.
“He was participating in party politics and prioritized that over sitting for the deposition,” BBC attorney Charles Tobin told the AP, adding that “we still haven’t been able to depose the plaintiff” with only two months left in the discovery period of the case.
If Trump does not attend a deposition before the deadline, he could face sanctions including the dismissal of his case. The only reprieve he can get is if the lawsuit’s discovery period is extended beyond December 18.
Trump is accusing the BBC of defaming him in a 2024 documentary about the January 6, 2021, Capitol insurrection, claiming the media company used deceptive editing to make it appear that he was urging his supporters to use violence to overturn the 2020 presidential election results. The network denies Trump’s accusations.
But the president was almost certainly trying to shake down the network, which appears to have backfired. BBC attorneys are trying to get his nemesis, former special counsel Jack Smith, to testify, and Trump has also fought attempts to subpoena his children and dig into his finances. He should have known better than to go after the BBC, which, being backed by licensing fees from the U.K.’s TV-owning public, wasn’t likely to settle with him. Now, he either has to win his case on its nonexistent merits, or drop it altogether.
This story has been updated.