President Donald Trump reacts as he holds a press conference at the end of his participation in the NATO leaders summit at the Bestepe Presidential Compound in Ankara, Turkey, July 8, 2026. REUTERS/Jonathan Ernst
Even as President Donald Trump attempts to cow media outlets, whether by having them purchased by sympathetic billionaires or pressuring them into settling frivolous litigation, one media outlet is showing that Trump’s efforts can be beaten back.
Now, they’re also turning the tables on him.
“The BBC, Great Britain’s state broadcaster, has become that rare thing: a mainstream media organization that has taken a stand against Trump’s rampant bullying,” wrote The Daily Beast's Tom Latchem on Sunday. “In October 2024, the BBC aired an hour-long documentary on Trump, in which two clips from his January 6, 2021 speech—given to supporters who had amassed that day in Washington, D.C.—were stitched into what looked like a single seamless call to march on the Capitol and ‘fight like hell.’”
The BBC has instead demanded that Trump disclose his financial information as a pretext for him paying them $1 billion, as he is demanding from them.
“He has racked up $86.5 million in settlements with Disney, Paramount Global, and the parent companies of YouTube, Twitter, and Facebook despite never having won a defamation case against them in court; the 80-year-old president must have thought BBC would roll over and cough up, too,” Latchem wrote. “Instead, the broadcaster has demanded Trump prove the documentary caused him financial damage by opening the books of his family trust that holds his entire empire, and has attempted to subpoena Don Jr., Ivanka Trump, and her husband, Jared Kushner, to testify.”
He added, “As a Brit who grew up watching the BBC (and later worked for it in various roles), I couldn’t be prouder of what it is doing to fight Trump’s worst excesses, and I can’t wait to see what happens next.”
The Daily Beast is not alone in celebrating media outlets standing up to Trump. Despite being on opposite sides politically from ABC talk show host Jimmy Kimmel, The Wall Street Journal praised the network for standing up to Trump as he attempts to threaten their broadcasting licenses over their support for Kimmel’s program.
“ABC sued the FCC on Tuesday for ‘coercing and retaliating’ because it ‘refuses to bow to the Administration’s demands,’” The Wall Street Journal editorial board wrote on Tuesday. “The lawsuit says the government has violated its First Amendment rights ‘by launching pretextual regulatory investigations and threatening the Stations’ valuable broadcast licenses.’”
Describing FCC Chairman Brendan Carr as a “mob-boss,” the Journal opined that Trump’s FCC is violating “the First Amendment by letting the FCC interfere in editorial judgments and suppress disfavored content and viewpoints. ABC’s lawsuit says the FCC’s pressure has resulted in it ‘passing on further consideration of booking several political candidates,’ and none have appeared on the program since February.”