Revealed: BBC Newsnight also doctored Trump speech

0:02The Telegraph

0:09We thought that the scandal involving the BBC editing footage of Donald Trump's speech ahead of the January 6th riots was purely confined to one documentary made by Panorama that was broadcast at the end of October 2024. But on today's Daily Tea, we can exclusively reveal that a very similar version of that footage was used by a completely different programme almost two and a half years earlier. This was on an edition of Newsnight. And once again, it's spliced together footage to give the impression that Donald Trump said something that his defenders say he did not. If that wasn't bad enough, a contributor to that Newsnight programme presented by Kirsty Wark, who has since departed the show, called Mick Mulvaney, who once worked for Donald Trump, called it out live on air, suggesting that the footage had been unfairly spliced to make it look as if President Trump had incited that insurrection.

1:13We're going to walk you through that footage, how it played out in real time. Plus, we'll introduce you to the man who brought the footage's existence to our attention, a former Newsnight freelancer called David Chaudois, who tells us that when complaints and concerns were raised about the use of the footage at an editorial meeting, this was brushed under the carpet. Welcome to this special edition of The Daily Tea with me, Camilla Tomini. And me, Tim Stanley.

1:49Tim, ring the breaking news bell. We've got a scoop on our hands here. The Daily Tea has an exclusive to share, and it's one that our audience and indeed the wider audience and even the White House are going to be interested in. I have a feeling Donald Trump will be watching this episode of The Daily Tea. It was, of course, the Telegraph's reporting, led by our brilliant colleague Gordon Rayner, that exposed the way in which Panorama had edited together different parts of Donald Trump's speech on January 6th, parts that were delivered an hour apart to give the impression that he had said to people at his rally, you must go to the Capitol Hill and you must fight.

2:32You must fight like hell, in fact. Fight like hell, because otherwise you'll lose your country. Now, we know how that story has ended or appeared to end. It ended with Tim Davies' resignation, that of his CEO, the head of news, Deborah Ternis, and now there is an investigation into the future of the BBC. its licence fee, and a huge national debate, actually, about bias and partiality at our national broadcaster. Just before we go any further, shall we remind ourselves of Gordon Rader's video explaining how the speech was doctored for the Panorama documentary? We're going to walk down to the Capitol, and I'll be there with you, and we fight.

3:13We fight like hell. But Trump didn't, in fact, say this at all. The BBC spliced together two clips that took place 54 minutes apart. So let's go through it again. We're gonna walk down to the Capitol and I'll be there with you. Now, see there, between Capitol and and, that's a cut. Here's what Trump actually said. We're gonna walk down to the Capitol. and we're going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women. It's different. It wasn't until nearly an hour later that he then said the second part of the BBC's version. We're going to walk down to the Capitol.

4:08And we fight. We fight like hell. And to remind you, that was an episode of Panorama that was broadcast on October 28, 2024. Now, Donald Trump has threatened to sue the BBC for a billion dollars over that misrepresentation of what he said. And he has given the corporation a deadline of tomorrow, Friday, to either apologise and fulfil some other criteria, or he's threatening to take them to the cleaners. We were contacted this week by a number of different people who have listened to The Daily Tee, including a graphic designer named David Chaudois. Now, he worked on Newsnight between 2022 and 2024.

4:50And he said he recalled this footage or a similar looking piece of film of Donald Trump's speech appearing in an episode of Newsnight and it being called out by somebody who was close to Donald Trump. I think the best way now to explain this part of this exclusive by The Daily Tea is listen to how that episode of Newsnight, which was broadcast on the 9th of June 2022, actually played out in real time. This episode of Newsnight was covering the congressional hearings into Donald Trump's role in the January 6th riots. That committee is beginning televised hearings as they try to decide on motive and the role that President Trump played in the chaos.

5:36Let's listen to Kirsty Walk's bit of VT in which she provides context for Trump's speech. Some of the events of that day are uncontested. As Congress met to formalise Biden's election victory, President Trump addressed a large rally of his supporters in central Washington, D.C. We're going to walk down anyone you want, but I think right here we're going to walk down to the Capitol. And we're going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women. And we fight. We fight like hell. And if you don't fight like hell, you're not going to have a country anymore. As you can hear there, Tim, it is virtually identical to the footage that appears in Panorama.

6:23Although, let's be fair, Newsnight was slightly more generous to Donald Trump because it does include the line, we're going to cheer on our brave senators and congressmen and women. But then it cuts to the fight like hell part and says that if you don't fight like hell, then you're not going to have a country anymore. And the footage then cuts immediately to scenes of people fighting. And it cuts seamlessly. So it does make it seem as if fight like hell came immediately after the initial statement, when in fact it came 54 minutes later in that particular speech. So march to Capitol Hill to support our congressmen and fight in order to save your country.

7:05Cut to video of people fighting. So Kirsty Walt then brings in two contributors to react to the footage and to speak about the whole story. One of them is Kadia Gober. She's a politics reporter for BuzzFeed. She was on the ground at the time of the Capitol riots that day. And then they also speak to Mick Mulvaney, who was Donald Trump's chief of staff from 2019 to 2020. He actually left the administration because of what happened on January the 6th and then went on to become quite a fierce critic of the president's. But despite his criticism, six minutes into the debate about January the 6th, Mulvaney is asked this, I have to say, very leading question by Kirsty Wall.

7:48Well, actually, Mick Mulvaney, up until the riots, you were a loyal aide. You had been chief of staff to Donald Trump. But Donald Trump galvanised and encouraged that crowd and stoked that crowd. And I wonder if you actually think that he actually believes in democracy. And then Mulvaney replies with this. A bunch of different questions there. Your video, and I'm no apologist for the president on this. No, no, I'm not suggesting you are. I'm not suggesting you are, but what I'm saying is that you... Your video actually spliced together the presentation. He said, we're going to go down and we're going to cheer on our senators and our House members.

8:22And then it actually goes on to say in some of them we might not be able to. And that line about we fight and fight like hell is actually later in the speech. And yet your video makes it look like those two things came together. That's the type of messaging here that so many people in my country find frustrating, is that it's hard to actually get the facts. The young woman from BuzzFeed is absolutely right. It was a violent attack. Yet there were people, and there's video of people walking peacefully through the Capitol buildings. If we're going to have a debate about what this was and prevent it from happening again, I think part of that is to make sure that we are straightforward and our presentation will actually happen.

8:57I mean, to be fair, Mulvaney has told this story for us. He has flagged very clearly, live on air, let's not forget, Newsnight goes out live. So at this point, you're in the gallery. I know how television works. As do you, we work in it. At this point, I would imagine it's slightly squeaky bum time because a piece of footage that the BBC has put out has been called out, not by a Trump fan, actually by a Trump critic saying, I mean, he uses the word spliced, which has now become common parlance when we talk about this story, the story of this BBC scandal. So the other noticeable thing is that the programme just goes on.

9:36I mean, it's sort of not even really acknowledged. For about another 10 minutes before the programme ends. I would argue this is worse than Panorama for the reason you said, because it was called out live on air. The error was spotted and yet it's taken many, many years for someone to bring it to us and for us to be reminded of it. Yes. Panorama, to be fair, no one on the programme live said, I can see you've spliced that. In this case, it's been called out and Newsnight does not react or apologise on the programme. Coming up next, we speak to a BBC whistleblower who was in the Newsnight editorial meeting the following morning when the spliced footage was discussed.

10:27What also makes this worse, Tim, is that we have spoken to a whistleblower who worked on Newsnight at the time that recalled this. we had to do a lot of journalistic digging to find the actual episode of Newsnight and can I congratulate the Daily Tease production team on that because they've done a huge amount of spade work. We spoke to David Chaudois during the week to find out what happened the following day when he attended, along with others, an editorial meeting. Mr Chaudois is a graphic designer. He did all the graphics for that episode and others. 35-year career in TV. award nominated graphic designer so a serious player in the tv scene he doesn't work in anymore he had some health problems and left but let's just hear him describe how this then played out the following morning as they carried out a post-mortem into the show the night before well let me first say that i really loved working at news night i very much enjoyed it i love the pressure of it and the fun of it and I'm not sort of knocking everybody or every single character who works there I work with some wonderful people and I also work with some arses but that's the truth of every you know every organization the night or the show that we're talking about in particular when you were on graphic when you were graphics and you're a lead designer You know, you went to the editorial meetings and there would be sometimes there would be a little postmortem of the show from the night before.

12:01And sometimes you would be talking about ideas, what stories were possibly going to come up that day. And there was a discussion around. Somebody brought it up saying, you know, what happened with that clip of Trump? Now, it was definitely the panorama clip, which is the one which is edited to remove that massive chunk in the middle. So he says, you know, go to the Capitol and fight like hell. So it was definitely that clip. And I saw that go out on Newsnight. He called out the presenter. He was on Zoom. There was a man from the Republican Party and there was a Democrat for balance. and the Republicans said, hang on a minute, you've conflated those two bits of VT together.

12:47One producer said, you know, how did that go out? You know, why did that happen? And the editorial editor, not the VT editor, kind of brushed it off. And I thought that that was extraordinary that something like that had gone out, but it was the BBC and you don't, when you're in that milieu, Yeah, you kind of don't question things. I'm just there for the graphics. That's what I do. And, you know, they don't really listen to you. I think in order for us to be fair and balanced, Tim, we need to point out, although David Chaudhoy himself said sometimes he leans left, sometimes he leans right, like all of us got different opinions about different things.

13:27This is one man's interpretation of the culture that he witnessed at Newsnight. And you could go to a great many different people who might give different interpretations of how they found the show was. Can you imagine the complaints that staff have about us? Oh, goodness me. HR is having a field day as we speak. The amount we've made them work on this story alone. Also, can I just say a word about Kirsty Walk, who I've always respected as a leading light of journalism in the UK and an inspiration to many female journalists. But what we have here is not just one man's recollections. We have stood it up by finding the footage that proves that he was correct about what was shown on the show.

14:09And I think the fact that two programs separately edited the footage in almost the same way confirms that this was not just one unique editorial error, but the product of a cultural problem within the BBC and a bias. What happened with Panorama happened again with Newsnight. And you can tell from the loaded question that Kirsty Wark gives to Mulvaney that I'm going to infer from this that they assumed, that we all assume, that Donald Trump was responsible for the January 6th riot. And the audience may still reach that conclusion. Millions of people have. But it is an inference. It's an assumption.

14:54It's an interpretation. And it's a highly controversial one within America. Well, it is a conclusion that anyone is likely to reach if they're presented with footage which says we're going to march on the Capitol closely followed by and fight like hell. Yes. Without the understanding that those two moments in the speech came 54 minutes apart. Yes. And we can have a debate, as we have had all week on the Daily Tea, about expediting the editing of footage in order to present people with soundbites. But the point is, and as Mulvaney points out, it's a dishonest representation of what he actually said that day.

15:32Two people resigned at the top. I respect the fact that they have chosen to go. Nonetheless, they both went insisting that they stand by the quality of BBC reporting. There is no impartiality problem. There is no impartiality. And other people at the BBC have done their best this week to suggest that this is a coup carried out by the Telegraph. We've had Ed Davey, leader of a minor party in Parliament, insisting that this is all being driven by Donald Trump. And whoops, what if we produced it? Evidence of more partiality by the BBC that, if anything, strengthens Donald Trump's case against the BBC.

16:13And also, I think it helps to put to bed suggestions that this has all come to light because of Robbie Gibb, who is the only seemingly right wing member of the BBC board. He's one among 12. I think it's extremely offensive at actually patronising to the other members of the board to suggest that one man, the former director of communications at number 10 under Theresa May, described by Emily Baitlis as an active agent of the Conservative Party, has orchestrated all this. What it really lends itself to is the suggestion that actually this desire to doctor footage to make Donald Trump look culpable is endemic at the organisation.

16:54Precisely. And that groupthink has taken hold to such an extent that there is no other way to do things. This is the way we must present it. What more proof do you need than the almost exact repetition of the same mistake? Seems to be a disconnect between what the BBC thinks of itself and what outsiders and licence fee payers think of the BBC. It again isn't a right-wing conspiracy or anything to do with Robbie Gibb that a YouGov poll last year revealed that half the general public of the UK do not trust the BBC to be impartial. That isn't our fault. I would humbly suggest that again, this may be a moment of self-reflection for the BBC.

17:34Can they just have a look at the second time footage has been doctored and then take a long, hard look at themselves and their own journalistic and editorial standards? That's just that's my reaction to this story. Don't call out the journalists who are pointing out bad journalism. Correct it and be better. And can I also state for the record, I'm not one of these people who wants to destroy the BBC. I just want the BBC to be better because we're paying for it and it is a bastion of British society and culture. It is packing a soft power punch overseas and now it's been introduced by the US president.

18:11It's been an absolute gift for a man who accuses of enemies, of fake news. We've now got the BBC being one of those enemies. It's actually globally quite embarrassing now. So can we just all do a little bit better and not pretend that we're the best journalists on earth and everyone else are bad journalists for pointing out bad journalism. Why do you assume he's guilty of something and shape the footage to back that up? It's the double standard that I think proves the partiality. We approached the BBC press office at noon today and gave them a full rundown of this podcast and the story that we're writing, which you can find on the Telegraph website as we speak.

18:51The BBC has not yet responded, so we await a response from the BBC. about this scoop. Well, a Daily Tea exclusive for you. Can we just say we are doing some live exclusive reporting here today on the Daily Tea and we shall be back with more of that tomorrow at 5pm.