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No, Brian Stelter, the Media Are the Problem, Not the Defamation Suits
Earlier this week, President Trump filed a $10 billion defamation suit against the BBC alleging that they deceptively edited his speech from January 6, 2021 to omit his call for the a peaceful protest; something the BBC seemed to cop to in an apology they issued in November. The fresh suit caused CNN chief media analyst Brian Stelter to clutch his pearls during a Tuesday edition of CNN News Central, where he suggested the suit was about chilling speech. He was wrong. The suits we’ve seen in recent years were to hold the media accountable, and save them from themselves.
“Number one, a year ago it was unheard of for a sitting American president to file a lawsuit against a news outlet. This never happened before until President Trump returned to office for his second term,” Stelter warned. “But now, this year, he has sued The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and as of this morning, the BBC. So, he is charting a new course, trying to take his war against the news media to court.”
Of course, Stelter conveniently ignored how the Obama Justice Department had targeted individual journalists and tried to lock them up: James Rosen (Fox News at the time) and James Risen (The New York Times at the time).
Stelter seemed to channel Puck News’s smears of the defamation case CNN lost earlier this year (which, in part, caused Puck to catch a defamation suit of their own) and claimed the case didn’t have standing in Florida, where it was filed:
And it's going to be very difficult for him to do so, but he's trying anyway. Even if these lawsuits are just PR stunts, he is getting the headlines he wants. He is charging defamation against the BBC and arguing that Florida is the appropriate venue for a lawsuit.
I spoke with numerous legal experts, media law professors overnight who are very skeptical of Trump's chances, in part because it's going to be hard to prove that he was actually damaged in Florida. But like I said, the headlines might be the point.
Despite of Stelter’s insistence that the case didn’t have standing in Florida, it arguably did for the same reasons the case against CNN was filed there. The BBC documentary was available online and viewable in Florida. Then there’s also the fact that Florida was Trump’s official residence (much like how Navy veteran Zachary Young’s business, Nemex was incorporated in Florida).
Stelter was right that a president had never taken the media to court so many times. But we’ve also not seen so many private citizens do the same until recent years.
Brian, maybe it's because the media had never been more radical and reckless with their reporting. Since Trump first became president, the media had grown more vicious and zealous in their perceived moral superiority (a dangerous combo); seeing themselves as paladins wielding their pens like swords against what they’ve openly claimed was an “existential threat” to the country and existence.
It's the reason they felt comfortable in targeting and smearing children like Nick Sandmann and 9-year-old Chiefs fan Holden Armenta. Also this year, just days before it went to trial, MSNBC had to settle their own defamation suit for erroneously dubbing a doctor the “uterus collector” because his had seen illegal immigrant women in ICE’s custody.
The ends justified the means to them: don’t you dare attend the March for Life or put face paint on or work for ICE, or we’ll crush you. That’s the real chilling of speech.
What Stelter would like to frame as “chilling critical speech” was actually about holding the media accountable and trying to get them to amend their behavior.
When CNN was found liable for malicious defamation against Young in January, the network was also made to pay Young punitive damages (which was paid out via an undisclosed settlement). The point of punitive damages was to make it painful for the defendant as a punishment to teach them a lesson. It also served the purpose as a warning to others who thought of doing the same.
Stelter was all for calling out what he saw as misinformation, like calling his efforts to put Fox News out of business “harm reduction”; but when it was about holding the leftist media to account for their misinformation, he condemned it.
Looks like CNN didn’t learn their lesson.
The transcript is below. Click "expand" to read:
CNN News Central
December 16, 2025
8:50:06 a.m. Eastern
KATE BOLDUAN: So, President Trump is now taking on the BBC, launching a defamation lawsuit against the British news giant for $10 billion over a documentary that he says was selectively edited. The President says the BBC cut together specific parts of the speech that he delivered on January 6, saying they deliberately omitted a section in which he called for peaceful protests. The BBC has acknowledged and apologized to President Trump, even admitting the error in judgment over the way the clips were edited, though they say that the President has no legal basis to sue them. But where does this go now?
CNN's chief media analyst Brian Stelter is following this one very closely for us. Brian, what do you see here?
BRIAN STELTER: Number one, a year ago it was unheard of for a sitting American president to file a lawsuit against a news outlet. This never happened before until President Trump returned to office for his second term. But now, this year, he has sued The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, and as of this morning, the BBC. So, he is charting a new course, trying to take his war against the news media to court.
And it's going to be very difficult for him to do so, but he's trying anyway. Even if these lawsuits are just PR stunts, he is getting the headlines he wants. He is charging defamation against the BBC and arguing that Florida is the appropriate venue for a lawsuit.
I spoke with numerous legal experts, media law professors overnight who are very skeptical of Trump's chances, in part because it's going to be hard to prove that he was actually damaged in Florida. But like I said, the headlines might be the point.
Here's what Professor Dylan McLemore told me overnight. He said, "the decision to file in Florida goes back to the question at the heart of all the president's suits against media companies, is he filing them to win in court or to create headlines and chill critical speech from the press?"
That is a question in some ways answers itself. So far the BBC not saying much about this suit, Kate. But the BBC has vowed to fight if Trump sues, as he has now done.
BOLDUAN: Yes. Brian, thank you so much for being all over this. Much more to come here. I really appreciate it.
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