Donald Trump actually does not wish to inform the BBC his financial institution steadiness

In this week’s US Dispatch newsletter, find out why Donald Trump doesn’t want to tell the BBC his bank balance, what Ed Miliband got up to in Washington this week, and why the President has gone all the way to Vegas

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This week Trump’s lawyers filed an emergency motion to change his ridiculous lawsuit against the BBC.

Quick recap: Trump is suing Auntie Beeb over an episode of Panorama that aired during the 2024 campaign, in which they edited a few sentences from his January 6th speech together. The BBC have apologised for the edit, which they say didn’t meet their standards and might lead people to think the sentences were said one after the other, which they weren’t. Crucially, though, they haven’t admitted that it might wrongly lead a viewer to think Trump was encouraging his supporters to march on the capitol building and try to prevent the lawful certification of his election loss to Joe Biden. They can’t admit to that. Because that’s exactly what he was doing. Countless legal bodies – courts, committees and congress – all reached that conclusion. It’s not at all controversial.

But Trump decided to sue the BBC for $10 billion, a truly Dr Evil amount of money, claiming his “brand, properties and businesses” had been damaged by the programme… which was not broadcast in the United States.

“Well,” the BBC’s lawyers said (I’m paraphrasing here), “if you’re saying it caused you financial damage, we’ll be taking a look at your financial records.” And during the phase of the lawsuit known as “discovery”, Trump was told he had to hand over information about the financial performance of hundreds of his companies.

Trump did not like this turn of events one little bit. So on Wednesday his lawyers submitted an emergency motion to change the lawsuit.

The proposed new complaint is still under wraps for now, but Trump’s lawyer Alejandro Brito has said it “focuses on President Trump’s damages allegations on the reputational harm that he has suffered, which is at the core of this defamation action” and on “personal reputational harm as the primary compensatory injury.”

And the Judge let him off the hook, agreeing on Thursday afternoon that he can re-word his complaint and keep his financial performance under wraps. But hey, it was worth a shot.

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Ed Miliband’s first trip to Washington could have gone worse.

Ed Miliband, the newly minted Foreign Secretary, sensibly ignored shouted questions from reporters on whether he still thought Donald Trump was a “an idiot, a racist and a misogynist” on his way to meet Secretary of State Marco Rubio. He wouldn’t want have to lie on camera in front of his host, that simply wouldn’t do.

Afterward, the readouts of the meeting from the two sides were different in exactly the ways you’d expect. The 90-minute meeting was productive and warm, our side said. They talked about the special relationship and NATO, Ukraine and the Strait of Hormuz, just as you’d expect.

The US State Department’s note of their chat was a little more curt, and had different highlights – particularly urging us to spend more on defence, a frequent bugbear of the President and a thorny subject for Andy Burnham. Spokesperson Tommy Pigot said: “The two discussed the importance of Europe taking on a greater role in its own security.”

We understand Ed also met with top members of the Senate Foreign Relations committee while he was in town. I deeply hope he also had time to try a half-smoke from Ben’s Chilli Bowl and had a cocktail in Off The Record, as all visitors to DC should.

Tone Deaf in Vegas

Trump gave a speech in Las Vegas the other night. And that location alone tells you a lot.

It’s the third time he’s been back to Vegas since his second inauguration – and the second since April. So is he secretly slipping out and hitting the slots? Nah, it’s just the only place his economic message is landing. Well, one bit of it. Maybe.

It’s kind of understandable that people in Las Vegas like his “no tax on tips” policy. Vegas has such a big hospitality industry that there’s a third rush hour at about midnight, because that’s when casino shift changes tend to be. The other thing Vegas has a lot of, which Trump doesn’t seem so keen to talk about is undocumented workers. If Trump carried out his promise of mass deportations in Sin City, it would most likely sink into the desert.

Anyway, if Trump’s going to Vegas for the second time in four months, it means someone in his team has decided to try and get him on message again. Their third shot at a reboot as the Republican Party stares down a severe drubbing in November’s midterm elections. All he needs to do is get up on that stage, say “NO TAX ON TIPS” and then shut up.

Of course he didn’t. He said “NO TAX ON TIPS” a few times, then it was all “the communists are coming” and “I want to fire the Supreme Court”, and “the radical left want to ban gasoline”. And that’s why he has a 38% approval rating.