Trump files up to $10bn lawsuit against BBC over edit of Capitol speech – as it happened

Our US politics live coverage is coming to a close. We’ll be back on Tuesday. Here is a summary of today’s developments:

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  Donald Trump has filed a lawsuit against the BBC over its editing of a speech he made to supporters in Washington before they stormed the US Capitol in 2021, requesting up to $10bn in damages. The US president alleged the broadcaster “intentionally, maliciously, and deceptively” edited his 6 January speech before the insurrection, in an episode of Panorama just over a year ago. More here.

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  Celebrities and lawmakers from both of the US’s major political parties are condemning Donald Trump after the president blamed the death of Rob Reiner on what he described as the acclaimed Hollywood director’s dislike of him. After the apparent killings of Reiner, 78, and his 68-year-old wife, Michele, who were found dead at their home Sunday in the Brentwood section of Los Angeles, Trump took to social media to call the director “tortured and struggling”. Trump also claimed Reiner died “due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind-crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME”. More here.

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  Donald Trump signed an executive order designating fentanyl as a “weapon of mass destruction” – classifying the synthetic opioid not only a lethal drug, but as a potential chemical weapon. The order also directs the Pentagon and justice department to take additional steps to combat production and distribution of the drug. The designation comes amid the administration’s use of escalating and increasingly militaristic tactics to combat drug smuggling. More here.

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  The United States has offered to provide Nato-style security guarantees for Kyiv as US and European negotiators report progress in talks to end Russia’s war in Ukraine, but a deal on territorial concessions remained elusive. Envoys sent by Donald Trump made the unprecedented offer at talks on Monday with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in Berlin. US officials have warned that such a deal would not be on the table forever. European leaders stressed the outcome of the talks would affect their own countries’ security for decades to come, write Andrew Roth, Deborah Cole and Shaun Walker. More here.

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  Kash Patel, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigations, is once again facing criticism for rushing to social media to tout his agency’s work on tracking down a person of interest in a shooting prematurely. After a shooter killed two and injured nine at Brown University on Saturday, Patel, a lawyer and rightwing commentator before his job in the administration, posted on X that his agency had helped detain a “person of interest in a hotel room” in Coventry, Rhode Island, acting off a lead from the Providence police. More here.

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President Donald Trump officially filed a $10bn lawsuit against the BBC on Monday after airing its 2024 “Panorama” documentary that distorted his 6 January 2021 speech.

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The lawsuit was filed in the southern district of Florida. It includes one count of defamation and one count of violating a Florida trade practices law, and the president is asking for $5bn in damages for each count.

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“Vile”. “Nonsense”. “Dreadful”. These are just some of the words prominent lawmakers and public figures are using as more reactions pile in after Donald Trump’s controversial social media post about the death of director and actor Rob Reiner.

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New York governor Kathy Hochul said that Reiner’s loved ones “deserve our condolences, not this insulting filth from Donald Trump.”

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Maryland representative Jamie Raskin called Trump’s post “a product of Deranged Trump Syndrome” that “teaches nothing but cruelty and nonsense.” The comment comes after the president suggested Reiner’s death was due to “TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME”.

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Presenter and former newspaper editor, Piers Morgan, called the remarks on Truth Social a “dreadful thing to say about a man who just got murdered by his troubled son.”

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“Delete it, Mr President @realDonaldTrump,” Morgan posted on X.

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Meanwhile, Washington representative Pramila Jayapal, posted on social media: “What a vile and self-obsessed post. The American people deserve so much better.”

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Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie also reacted to Trump’s attack, calling it “completely shocking and not the least bit surprising at the very same time.”

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Celebrities and lawmakers from both of the US’s major political parties are condemning Donald Trump after the president blamed the death of Rob Reiner on what he described as the acclaimed Hollywood director’s dislike of him.

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“What a disgusting and vile statement,” actor Patrick Schwarzenegger wrote on X.

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Similarly, television host Whoopi Goldberg, who described Reiner as her friend and “quite an amazing man,” condemned Trump.

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Referencing Trump’s own attacks on critics of the far-right political activist Charlie Kirk, who was shot dead in September. That killing prompted reprisals from the White House against those who cited Kirk’s history of hostile rhetoric toward immigrants, women and other marginalized groups. And Goldberg said: “I don’t understand the man in the White House. He spoke at length about Charlie Kirk and about caring, and then this is what he puts out. Have you no shame? No shame at all? Can you get any lower? I don’t think so.”

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Meanwhile, California’s Democratic governor Gavin Newsom wrote on X: “This is a sick man.”

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Echoing Newsom, US House member Maxwell Alejandro Frost, a Florida Democrat, said: “What a despicable piece of garbage.”

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US senator Chris Murphy, a Connecticut Democrat, similarly said of Trump: “He’s just lost it. Now saying Rob and Michele Reiner caused their own murder because they didn’t support him. So sick.”

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US House member Zoe Lofgren, another California Democrat, called Trump’s comments “a new low for this petty, hateful man”. Lofgren added: “His party needs to condemn this.”

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Similarly, US House member Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia Republican, wrote: “This is a family tragedy, not about politics or political enemies.”

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Read the full story:

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Asked by a reporter if he stands by his statement on Rob Reiner’s death after a number of Republicans have denounced it, Trump doesn’t offer any sympathy, doubles down on his dislike for Reiner AND refers to himself in the third person.

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Well, I wasn’t a fan of his at all, he was a deranged person as far as Trump is concerned.

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He knew it was false, in fact it was the exact opposite, but he said that I was a friend of Russia, controlled by Russia, the Russia hoax, he was one of the people behind it.

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I think he hurt himself career-wise, he became like a deranged person, Trump derangement syndrome.

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So I was not a fan of Rob Reiner at all, in any way, shape or form. I thought he was very bad for our country.

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Trump says he’s suing the BBC for “putting words in my mouth” and that he’ll be filing the suit “probably this afternoon or tomorrow morning”.

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He suggests the BBC used AI to put words in his mouth. But the broadcaster is not accused of changing the words Trump said; rather it is accused of editing a speech that Trump made on 6 January 2021 in such a way that made it appear clearer that he encouraged the US Capitol attack.

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Below is a side-by-side comparison of the original and edited footage in question, which shows how the BBC selectively edited the speech.

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An edition of Panorama, broadcast a week before the 2024 US election, spliced together clips of the speech, suggesting that Trump told the crowd: ‘We’re going to walk down to the Capitol and I’ll be there with you, and we fight. We fight like hell.’ The words were taken from sections of his speech almost an hour apart.

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Tim Davie, the BBC’s director general; and the head of BBC News resigned over the affair, and the broadcaster issued an apology.

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“With this historic executive order I will sign today, we’re formally classifying fentanyl as a weapon of mass destruction, which is what it is,” Trump says.

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Turning to a mix of the border, gas prices and drug smuggling, Trump claims drug smuggling by sea is “down 94%”, adding: “And we’re going to start hitting them on land.”

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“I think we’re closer now than we have been ever,” he adds, referring to the prospect of ending the war. “We’re having tremendous support from European leaders, they want to get it ended also.”

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FBI director Kash Patel is once again facing criticism for rushing to social media to tout his agency’s work on tracking down a person of interest in a shooting prematurely.

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After a shooter killed two and injured nine at Brown University on Saturday, Patel, a lawyer and rightwing commentator before his job in the administration, posted on X that his agency had helped detain a “person of interest in a hotel room” in Coventry, Rhode Island, acting off a lead from the Providence police.

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But the person of interest was later released from custody hours later, and the shooter is still at large.

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director Kash Patel speaks during a news conference on 4 December.”,”caption”:”FBI director Kash Patel speaks during a news conference on 4 December.”,”credit”:”Photograph: Bonnie Cash/UPI/Shutterstock”}},{“_type”:”model.dotcomrendering.pageElements.TextBlockElement”,”html”:”

“We have not yet solved this case, but I am confident we are going to do that in the near future,” Rhode Island attorney general Peter Neronha said today, adding there was only a “quantum of evidence which justified detaining this person as a person of interest”.

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Local authorities said in a press conference on Sunday night that a tip came in about the person of interest, which the FBI picked up and investigated. The evidence wasn’t sufficient to keep the person in custody.

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It isn’t the first time Patel has erroneously posted online to tout police work. After Charlie Kirk was murdered on a college campus in September, Patel shared on social media that “the subject for the horrific shooting today that took the life of Charlie Kirk is now in custody”, though the shooter had not yet been apprehended. Conservatives came after Patel for the error. Some have referred to him as “Keystone Kash”, a reference to slapstick policing by Keystone cops depicted in silent films.

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Agents within the bureau and those who have recently left it have said Patel is “in over his head” and leading a “chronically underperforming” agency paralyzed by fear and plummeting morale, a report compiled earlier this month said. The FBI sources told a national group that Patel doesn’t have the experience necessary to run the agency, leaving it a “rudderless ship”.

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I’m just off a call with US officials on Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner’s discussions with the Ukrainians and European delegations in Berlin, which included nearly 8 hours of meetings with Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

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While the discussions were described as constructive in particular concerning future US-brokered security guarantees for Ukraine, it sounds like the sides are quite far from a comprehensive peace deal, with significant differences remaining on the future status of the occupied Ukrainian territory, as well as key issues like the future operations of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant.

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The US delegation was upbeat. The officials claimed that they are “90%” of the way toward a deal between Ukraine and Russia — in particular, the US delegation claimed that they had developed “Article 5-like” security guarantees for Ukraine that had satisfied both Kyiv and the Europeans (we’ll see what the Europeans brief about that).

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The US officials said they wouldn’t release details of the security guarantees yet, but that it included “very strong safeguards” to prevent the war from restarting if a deal is reached. That said, the US won’t be putting boots on the ground in Ukraine according to the officials, so they’ll have to release more details to convince skeptics that Russia will respect those “Article 5-like” guarantees in the future.

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A lot of questions remain.

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The main one is territory. It was clear from the call that there is not an agreement yet on who would control what territory after a peace deal and how that territory would be recognised. One US official said they had “brainstormed” on turning the occupied Ukrainian territory into an “economic free zone” and they had spent “a lot of time trying to define what that would mean, how it operates”.

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So there’s a long way to go in those discussions as well, and the US officials admitted that they may not be able to get that issue across the line: “Ultimately, if we can get that defined, then it will really get to [Russia and Ukraine] to work out the final issues of sovereignty and to see if there’s a deal that can be done between them.”

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The US officials said they’ll go back to working groups in the US this weekend, but that they’re ready to travel to Russia or Ukraine in the future if the deal can get done.

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Democratic representative Zoe Lofgren, of California, called on the president’s party to condemn his “making light” of Rob and Michele Reiner’s deaths, which she called “a new low for this petty, hateful man”. She wrote on X:

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n

Rob Reiner was a beloved Californian who always used his platform to make the world better. Donald Trump making light of him and his wife’s murders is a new low for this petty, hateful man. His party needs to condemn this.

n

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More Republicans are weighing in on Trump’s earlier comments around the deaths of Rob and Michele Reiner.

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Kentucky representative Thomas Massie, who has fiercely opposed Trump on several issues and been personally attacked by the president as a result, called Trump’s comments “inappropriate and disrespectful” and challenged his GOP colleagues to defend them. He wrote on X:

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n

Regardless of how you felt about Rob Reiner, this is inappropriate and disrespectful discourse about a man who was just brutally murdered. I guess my elected GOP colleagues, the VP, and White House staff will just ignore it because they’re afraid? I challenge anyone to defend it.

n

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And Georgia representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a once staunch ally turned vocal critic of Trump who last month abruptly announced her resignation after a bitter public falling out with the president, wrote:

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n

Rob Reiner and his wife were tragically killed at the hands of their own son, who reportedly had drug addiction and other issues, and their remaining children are left in serious mourning and heartbreak. This is a family tragedy, not about politics or political enemies. Many families deal with a family member with drug addiction and mental health issues. It’s incredibly difficult and should be met with empathy especially when it ends in murder.

n

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Nick Reiner has been arrested following the death of his parents, according to Los Angeles jail records.

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In an astonishing post on Truth Social this morning, Donald Trump suggested that Hollywood director Rob Reiner, 78, who was found dead at his home alongside his wife Michele, 68, in what is being investigated as an “apparent homicide”, was killed because he angered people with his “Trump Derangement Syndrome”.

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Reiner had spoken out about Trump many times over the years. He said in a 2017 interview with Variety that he thought Trump was “mentally unfit” to be president and called him the “single most unqualified human being to ever assume the presidency of the United States”.

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He also told the Guardian last year that Trump’s re-election could lead to the US turning into an autocracy. “We see autocracy making its move around the world,” he said. “And so if we [the US] crumble, there’s a danger that democracy crumbles around the world.”

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The president’s Truth Social post has been met with fierce criticism online, with many commentators calling it “disgusting” and “depraved”. Others have also contrasted Trump’s words with his administration’s calls for compassion after the killing of Charlie Kirk (and its crackdown on anyone it deemed to be “celebrating” or “making light” of it). At the time, Trump called Kirk’s killing a “the tragic consequence of demonizing those with whom you disagree”.

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This clip has been making the rounds, in which Reiner poignantly explained that he had felt “absolute horror” at Kirk’s assassination in September. “That should’ve never happened to anybody,” Reiner told Piers Morgan. “I don’t care what your political beliefs are – that’s not acceptable, that’s not a solution.” He added that he found Kirk’s widow’s forgiveness of her husband’s killer “beautiful” and “admirable”. It would be one of Reiner’s final television interviews.

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A quote from Kirk himself in 2016 has also resurfaced today: “You can tell a lot about a person by the way they react when someone dies.”

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Good morning, and welcome to our live coverage of US politics.

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Ilhan Omar, the Somalia-born Minnesota congresswoman, has said her son was pulled over by ICE agents on Saturday and asked to provide proof of citizenship.

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“Yesterday, after he made a stop at Target, he did get pulled over by ICE agents, and once he was able to produce his passport ID, they did let him go,” she told WCCO’s Esme Murphy.

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Omar fled civil war as a young child, came to the US as a refugee and became a US citizen in 2000.

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She became one of the first people of Muslim faith to be elected to the US Congress after winning Minnesota’s fifth congressional district in the midterm elections in 2018.

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Omar told WCCO that it was “disturbing” and “creepy” to have the president be “obsessed with you” – but said it is a deflection tactic to focus attention away from his political failures.

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Closing summary

Our US politics live coverage is coming to a close. We’ll be back on Tuesday. Here is a summary of today’s developments:

• Donald Trump has filed a lawsuit against the BBC over its editing of a speech he made to supporters in Washington before they stormed the US Capitol in 2021, requesting up to $10bn in damages. The US president alleged the broadcaster “intentionally, maliciously, and deceptively” edited his 6 January speech before the insurrection, in an episode of Panorama just over a year ago. More here.

• Celebrities and lawmakers from both of the US’s major political parties are condemning Donald Trump after the president blamed the death of Rob Reiner on what he described as the acclaimed Hollywood director’s dislike of him. After the apparent killings of Reiner, 78, and his 68-year-old wife, Michele, who were found dead at their home Sunday in the Brentwood section of Los Angeles, Trump took to social media to call the director “tortured and struggling”. Trump also claimed Reiner died “due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind-crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME”. More here.

• Donald Trump signed an executive order designating fentanyl as a “weapon of mass destruction” – classifying the synthetic opioid not only a lethal drug, but as a potential chemical weapon. The order also directs the Pentagon and justice department to take additional steps to combat production and distribution of the drug. The designation comes amid the administration’s use of escalating and increasingly militaristic tactics to combat drug smuggling. More here.

• The United States has offered to provide Nato-style security guarantees for Kyiv as US and European negotiators report progress in talks to end Russia’s war in Ukraine, but a deal on territorial concessions remained elusive. Envoys sent by Donald Trump made the unprecedented offer at talks on Monday with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in Berlin. US officials have warned that such a deal would not be on the table forever. European leaders stressed the outcome of the talks would affect their own countries’ security for decades to come, write Andrew Roth, Deborah Cole and Shaun Walker. More here.

• Kash Patel, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigations, is once again facing criticism for rushing to social media to tout his agency’s work on tracking down a person of interest in a shooting prematurely. After a shooter killed two and injured nine at Brown University on Saturday, Patel, a lawyer and rightwing commentator before his job in the administration, posted on X that his agency had helped detain a “person of interest in a hotel room” in Coventry, Rhode Island, acting off a lead from the Providence police. More here.

The Pentagon announced this evening that the US military conducted another deadly strike on a boat suspected of carrying illegal narcotics, killing eight men in the eastern Pacific.

A video posted on Twitter/X shows the strike by the US southern command, stating that at the direction of defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, the “Joint Task Force Southern Spear conducted lethal kinetic strikes on three vessels operated by Designated Terrorist Organizations in international waters.”

The statement continues: “Intelligence confirmed that the vessels were transiting along known narco-trafficking routes in the Eastern Pacific and were engaged in narco-trafficking. A total of eight male narco-terrorists were killed during these actions—three in the first vessel, two in the second and three in the third.”

The United States has offered to provide Nato-style security guarantees for Kyiv as US and European negotiators report progress in talks to end Russia’s war in Ukraine, but a deal on territorial concessions remained elusive.

Envoys sent by Donald Trump made the unprecedented offer at talks on Monday with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, in Berlin.

US officials have warned that such a deal would not be on the table forever. European leaders stressed the outcome of the talks would affect their own countries’ security for decades to come, write Andrew Roth, Deborah Cole and Shaun Walker.

Zelenskyy said after the talks he would ask the US to hit Russia with sanctions and provide Ukraine with more arms, including long-range weapons, if Moscow rejected the proposals being discussed between Kyiv, Washington and European leaders.

“I think America will apply sanctions pressure and give us more weapons if he [Putin] rejects everything,” Zelenskyy told reporters. Kyiv supported the idea of a ceasefire, in particular for energy strikes, during the Christmas period, he added.

Read the full explainer here:

Politico reports that new dates have been set for the depositions of Bill and Hillary Clinton, which were originally scheduled for this week on Capitol Hill as part of the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein.

Their appearances are now slated for 13 and 14 January, according to a letter sent to an attorney for the Clintons from the House oversight and government reform committee chair James Comer.

The move comes in advance of Friday, the deadline set for the Trump administration to release its full files on Epstein.

“If your clients do not comply with these new dates, the Committee will move immediately to contempt proceedings,” said Comer, who is leading the congressional investigation into Epstein, according to the letter obtained by Politico.

Donald Trump’s lawsuit against the BBC was filed in a personal capacity and names the BBC and BBC studios productions as defendants. He is being represented by attorneys Alejandro Brito, Edward Paltzik and Daniel Epstein.

A spokesperson for Trump’s legal team told Fox News: “The formerly respected and now disgraced BBC defamed President Trump by intentionally, maliciously, and deceptively doctoring his speech in a brazen attempt to interfere in the 2024 Presidential Election. The BBC has a long pattern of deceiving its audience in coverage of President Trump, all in service of its own leftist political agenda. President Trump’s powerhouse lawsuit is holding the BBC accountable for its defamation and reckless election interference just as he has held other fake news mainstream media responsible for their wrongdoing.”

The BBC has apologized for splicing two clips of a speech Trump made before the Capitol riots in January 2021, but has disagreed about a defamation claim. Last month, BBC’s chair Samir Shah told staff the broadcaster was “determined to fight” Trump’s claims that the programme defamed him.

Trump files lawsuit against BBC over edit of January 6 speech

President Donald Trump officially filed a $10bn lawsuit against the BBC on Monday after airing its 2024 “Panorama” documentary that distorted his 6 January 2021 speech.

The lawsuit was filed in the southern district of Florida. It includes one count of defamation and one count of violating a Florida trade practices law, and the president is asking for $5bn in damages for each count.

Bloomberg News reports that the Food and Drug Administration has no plans to put a “black box” warning on Covid-19 vaccines, which is the agency’s most serious warning.

FDA commissioner Marty Makary confirmed the news on Bloomberg TV after CNN reported last week that the FDA was preparing to change the safety information related to the shots. Makary said: “We have no plans to put that on the Covid vaccine.”

Placing this warning on Covid-19 vaccines, which saved an estimated 20 million lives around the world, would further health and human services secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr’s campaign against vaccines in general. Earlier this year, he canceled $500m in funding for mRNA vaccines, ending 22 federal contracts, including one with Moderna for its bird flu vaccine for humans.

The department of justice arrested four people in connection with an alleged plot to bomb several locations of two US companies on New Year’s Eve in southern California, according to a post by attorney general Pam Bondi.

Bondi said that members of the Turtle Island Liberation Front, which she described as an “anti-government” and “anti-capitalist group”, was planning to conduct “a series of bombings against multiple targets in California beginning on New Year’s Eve”.

“The group also planned to target ICE agents and vehicles,” Bondi added.

The criminal complaint reads: “The co-conspirators then took numerous steps toward executing the bombing plot, including acquiring bomb-making materials and traveling to a remote location in the Mojave Desert to construct and detonate test explosive devices on December 12, 2025.”

The group members were arrested by the FBI “before they completed assembling a functional explosive device”, according to the filing.

A motive is still unclear, but officials said the individuals are members of an offshoot of a group called the Turtle Island Liberation Front, which calls for decolonization, tribal sovereignty, and “the working class to rise up and fight back against capitalism”, according to the complaint.

The Trump administration argued in a court filing today that construction of the White House ballroom must continue for national security reasons, the AP reports.

The filing comes after a lawsuit brought last Friday by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. The suit asks a federal judge to pause the construction until it undergoes independent reviews and receives congressional approval.

The Trump administration included a declaration from the deputy director of the US Secret Service in the filing, stating that more work on the site of the former White House East Wing is needed to meet the agency’s “safety and security requirements.”

Dani Anguiano

Attorneys with the US Department of Justice have reportedly said they felt pressured to accuse the University of California of discriminating against Jewish students and faculty, at the urging of the Trump administration, in what one lawyer described as a “hit job”.

Nine attorneys, some of whom requested anonymity, shared insider accounts with the Los Angeles Times of the federal government’s investigation into California’s research university system. The attorneys said they felt pushed to conclude the UC had violated the law before they had determined the facts. All of the attorneys eventually resigned.

“The political appointees essentially determined the outcome almost before the investigation had even started,” Jen Swedish, a former DoJ lawyer who worked on the case against the University of California, Los Angeles, told the newspaper.

The investigation was centered on allegations of antisemitism that emerged during pro-Palestinian protests at UC campuses, amid a wave of student activism and demonstrations against the war in Gaza that unfolded at universities nationwide.

Read the full story:

Sara Braun

Gavin Newsom, the California governor, announced the appointment of two prominent scientists who left the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in recent months over conflicts with the Trump administration to state positions.

Dr Susan Monarez, the former director of the CDC, will lead California’s new public health initiative, the Public Health Network Innovation Exchange (PHNIX).

In August, Monarez was fired by the Trump administration less than a month into the top job at the CDC after refusing to step down. Monarez had clashed with Health and Human Services (HHS) secretary Robert F Kennedy Jr. on vaccine policy.

Newsom also hired former CDC chief medical officer Dr Debra Houry, who resigned after a decade at the agency after Monarez’s dismissal.

Both Monarez and Houry testified before Congress in September to voice their concerns about secretary Kennedy’s vaccine agenda and the sweeping changes he was making to the country’s public health system.

Read the full story:

More politicians condemn Trump as he doubles down on attack of deceased director Rob Reiner

“Vile”. “Nonsense”. “Dreadful”. These are just some of the words prominent lawmakers and public figures are using as more reactions pile in after Donald Trump’s controversial social media post about the death of director and actor Rob Reiner.

New York governor Kathy Hochul said that Reiner’s loved ones “deserve our condolences, not this insulting filth from Donald Trump.”

Maryland representative Jamie Raskin called Trump’s post “a product of Deranged Trump Syndrome” that “teaches nothing but cruelty and nonsense.” The comment comes after the president suggested Reiner’s death was due to “TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME”.

Presenter and former newspaper editor, Piers Morgan, called the remarks on Truth Social a “dreadful thing to say about a man who just got murdered by his troubled son.”

“Delete it, Mr President @realDonaldTrump,” Morgan posted on X.

Meanwhile, Washington representative Pramila Jayapal, posted on social media: “What a vile and self-obsessed post. The American people deserve so much better.”

Former New Jersey governor Chris Christie also reacted to Trump’s attack, calling it “completely shocking and not the least bit surprising at the very same time.”

Trump’s post on Rob Reiner sparks outrage from lawmakers and celebrities

Maya Yang

Celebrities and lawmakers from both of the US’s major political parties are condemning Donald Trump after the president blamed the death of Rob Reiner on what he described as the acclaimed Hollywood director’s dislike of him.

“What a disgusting and vile statement,” actor Patrick Schwarzenegger wrote on X.

Similarly, television host Whoopi Goldberg, who described Reiner as her friend and “quite an amazing man,” condemned Trump.

Referencing Trump’s own attacks on critics of the far-right political activist Charlie Kirk, who was shot dead in September. That killing prompted reprisals from the White House against those who cited Kirk’s history of hostile rhetoric toward immigrants, women and other marginalized groups. And Goldberg said: “I don’t understand the man in the White House. He spoke at length about Charlie Kirk and about caring, and then this is what he puts out. Have you no shame? No shame at all? Can you get any lower? I don’t think so.”

Meanwhile, California’s Democratic governor Gavin Newsom wrote on X: “This is a sick man.”

Echoing Newsom, US House member Maxwell Alejandro Frost, a Florida Democrat, said: “What a despicable piece of garbage.”

US senator Chris Murphy, a Connecticut Democrat, similarly said of Trump: “He’s just lost it. Now saying Rob and Michele Reiner caused their own murder because they didn’t support him. So sick.”

US House member Zoe Lofgren, another California Democrat, called Trump’s comments “a new low for this petty, hateful man”. Lofgren added: “His party needs to condemn this.”

Similarly, US House member Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Georgia Republican, wrote: “This is a family tragedy, not about politics or political enemies.”

Read the full story:

Trump doubles down on Rob Reiner statement, mocking dead director again

Asked by a reporter if he stands by his statement on Rob Reiner’s death after a number of Republicans have denounced it, Trump doesn’t offer any sympathy, doubles down on his dislike for Reiner AND refers to himself in the third person.

Well, I wasn’t a fan of his at all, he was a deranged person as far as Trump is concerned.

He knew it was false, in fact it was the exact opposite, but he said that I was a friend of Russia, controlled by Russia, the Russia hoax, he was one of the people behind it.

I think he hurt himself career-wise, he became like a deranged person, Trump derangement syndrome.

So I was not a fan of Rob Reiner at all, in any way, shape or form. I thought he was very bad for our country.

Per my earlier post, Trump confirms that he’s considering an executive order to reclassify marijuana “because a lot of people want to see it … because it leads to a tremendous amount of research that can’t be done unless you reclassify it.”

“We are looking at that very strongly,” Trump tells reporters in the Oval Office.

Trump says he’s suing the BBC ‘probably this afternoon or tomorrow morning’ for ‘putting words in my mouth’

Trump says he’s suing the BBC for “putting words in my mouth” and that he’ll be filing the suit “probably this afternoon or tomorrow morning”.

He suggests the BBC used AI to put words in his mouth. But the broadcaster is not accused of changing the words Trump said; rather it is accused of editing a speech that Trump made on 6 January 2021 in such a way that made it appear clearer that he encouraged the US Capitol attack.

Below is a side-by-side comparison of the original and edited footage in question, which shows how the BBC selectively edited the speech.

An edition of Panorama, broadcast a week before the 2024 US election, spliced together clips of the speech, suggesting that Trump told the crowd: ‘We’re going to walk down to the Capitol and I’ll be there with you, and we fight. We fight like hell.’ The words were taken from sections of his speech almost an hour apart.

Tim Davie, the BBC’s director general; and the head of BBC News resigned over the affair, and the broadcaster issued an apology.

“America’s adversaries are trafficking fentanyl into the United States at least in part because they want to kill Americans,” he says.