President Donald Trump has canceled a scheduled deposition in his $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the British Broadcasting Corporation, with his lawyers informing the court that he is unavailable due to other matters of national importance. The development has led the BBC to seek judicial intervention, as the network argues that a plaintiff cannot indefinitely delay questioning after initiating legal action.
According to a court filing submitted on Tuesday, the deposition was initially scheduled for October 16. However, Trump's attorneys notified the BBC on September 28 that the president could no longer attend, later advising that he would remain unavailable until at least mid-December while proposing a rescheduled date in January.
The BBC has now asked US Magistrate Judge Enjoliqué Lett to address the matter during an upcoming hearing next week, aiming to force Trump to commit to a firm deposition schedule before the discovery period concludes. Trump's legal team attributed the cancellation to unspecified obligations of national importance, though the filing did not detail why these duties prevented his participation.
Attorneys for the BBC argued that this reasoning is inadequate at this advanced stage of the litigation. In the court filing, attorney Charles Tobin pointed out that nearly eight months of discovery have elapsed, seven BBC witnesses have already been deposed, and only two months of discovery remain without a scheduled date to question the central figure of the lawsuit.
Both sides had previously agreed in July to hold the deposition on October 16 while keeping the logistics confidential for security reasons, an agreement the BBC states Trump's lawyers withdrew from weeks before the planned testimony. A spokesperson for Trump's legal team defended the decision, asserting that the lawsuit holds the network accountable for defamation and election interference.
Trump filed the lawsuit in December 2025, claiming the BBC defamed him via a documentary regarding the 2020 presidential election by editing footage from his January 6, 2021, Ellipse speech to suggest he directly incited the Capitol violence. While the BBC previously apologized for the edit and acknowledged it could create a mistaken impression, it maintained the juxtaposition was inadvertent and denied defamation. Trump initially sought $10 billion in damages before narrowing his claims to focus strictly on reputational harm after the network requested related financial records.