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Judge Enjoliqué Lett Orders Donald Trump To Depose Under Oath In BBC Defamation Case

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U.S. Magistrate Judge Enjoliqué Lett orders Trump to sit for deposition by December 11 Failure to comply could result in sanctions or dismissal of the $10 billion BBC lawsuit

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Source coverage18 outlets
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Close-up serious portrait of man in suit, dark background2 June 2025 · Archive photoPhoto: Daniel Torok, Public domain
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Compared

18 outlets told this the same way.

Shared framing

Headlines report a court order requiring Trump to sit for a deposition in his BBC case, with some mentioning a deadline or the risk his suit could be dismissed. A separate strand repeats his claim that he is too busy; the deposition has not yet occurred.

5 of 20 outlets · 5 of 21 headlines analysed

  • BloombergOrdered to Sit for Deposition
  • The HillJudge orders Trump to be deposed
  • MS NOWJudge orders Trump to sit for deposition
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Court compulsion of the plaintiff

Many headlines foreground the judge compelling Trump to sit for testimony, stressing judicial force rather than the underlying defamation dispute.

Other angles in this collection

Case at risk if he does not comply

2 outlets · 2 headlines

Some outlets go beyond the order itself and emphasise jeopardy for Trump's own lawsuit if he fails to cooperate with discovery demands.

Excuse of being too busy to attend

1 outlets · 2 headlines

A Telegraph line spotlights Trump's claimed unavailability, framing the dispute around his asserted busyness rather than only the court ruling.

All 21 analysed headlines

Counts describe this collection. One headline may support more than one angle.

Analysed 22 Oct 2026.

Reviewed by Codex validator (AI) · 22 Oct 2026

Trump ordered to testify

A federal judge ordered President Donald Trump to sit for a deposition under oath in his $10 billion defamation lawsuit against the BBC by Dec. 11, with the order coming after BBC lawyers complained that Trump delayed his appearance.

Magistrate Judge Enjoliqué Lett set the deadline as Charles Tobin told the court that “we still haven’t been able to depose the plaintiff,” with two months left in the discovery period.

Tobin said the parties had agreed on Oct. 16, but Trump canceled it for a “matter of national importance,” and Tobin added that Trump was campaigning in Georgia that day.

The BBC acknowledged that filmmakers spliced together quotes from different sections of Trump’s Jan. 6, 2021, speech to supporters before the storming of the U.S. Capitol, and the broadcaster apologized for the editing while denying Trump’s defamation claims.

Reporting for this sectionAP News20Minutos

Oct. 16 cancellation dispute

Tobin told the court that Trump canceled the agreed Oct. 16 deposition date for a “matter of national importance,” and Tobin said Trump was instead campaigning in Georgia.

Magistrate Judge Enjoliqué Lett warned that Trump must sit for a deposition by Dec. 11 or face sanctions up to dismissal of his lawsuit, unless the discovery period was extended past Dec. 18.

The BBC argued that Trump was improperly delaying his deposition, and the BBC asked the judge to compel Trump to appear after the Oct. 16 subpoena was canceled.

Trump’s lawyers said the president could appear for the interview between 11 and 22 January next year, and they claimed the BBC was “wrong to claim that President Trump is avoiding his deposition in this action.”

Reporting for this sectionAP NewsBBC

Discovery, subpoenas, and risk

The court scheduled discovery to end Dec. 18, and the BBC’s attorneys sought Trump’s deposition before that deadline as they tried to obtain information they said they were entitled to in the case.

The proceedings also included a dispute over a subpoena for membership records at Mar-a-Lago, and Magistrate Judge Enjoliqué Lett backed the subpoena while expressing skepticism about whether Trump’s team had done an adequate search for internal documents.

The BBC also issued at least 47 subpoenas to former and current government officials and private advisers in Trump’s circle, including Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, former Attorney General Bill Barr, and former White House counsel Pat Cipollone.

Trump’s side opposed deposing former special counsel Jack Smith, and the filing argued, “Smith lacks any personal knowledge regarding the issues in this matter,” while the BBC countered that it was “difficult to imagine a more authoritative source” than Smith for the Jan. 6 issues.

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Close-up portrait of man in suit with US flag behind6 October 2017 · Archive photoPhoto: Shealah Craighead / White House, Public domain
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