Judge Jeffrey Kuntz, nominated by President Trump, has assumed control of the President’s $10 bn defamation lawsuit against the BBC.
Trump approved Kuntz’s appointment to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida in July, after a 51‑46 confirmation vote in the Senate.
He is replacing Judge Roy Altman, who had been presiding over the controversial case. Altman, also a Trump nominee, had overseen the legal action stemming from the BBC’s Panorama programme, which edited a speech Trump gave outside the Capitol on 6 January 2021.
The lawsuit, scheduled for trial in February 2027, seeks damages for what Trump claims is the deliberate distortion of his remarks. The BBC has issued an apology for the editing but argues that the program did not meet defamation legal criteria and that the Florida court lacks jurisdiction.
In addition to presiding over this case, Kuntz was involved in other defamation disputes, including the ongoing lawsuit against the Pulitzer Prize board, and placed emphasis on how former president’s statements were portrayed in the media.
Questions arose about a potential conflict of interest, given that Kuntz was in conversations about a federal appointment while he was handling the Pulitzer case. He has publicly stated that, according to Florida judicial ethics rules, he was not required to step away from that case.
Beyond defamation, Kuntz’s judicial career includes rulings on sensitive issues such as the release of grand jury documents related to Jeffrey Epstein and whether a Pulse nightclub survivor could sue a security company involved in the 2016 shooting.
With Kuntz now at the helm, the trial will confront both the integrity of journalistic editing practices and the legal limits of defamation claims in the United States.
