BBC leaders resign amid scandal over misleading edit of Trump speech

Two top leaders at the BBC resigned on Sunday amid an escalating scandal over impartiality and bias that plunged Britain’s public broadcaster into one of its biggest crises in recent years.

The BBC’s most senior executive, director general Tim Davie, and the chief executive of the news division, Deborah Turness, both quit after the leak of a deeply critical memo that, among other things, revealed that the BBC had misleadingly edited a speech by US President Donald Trump to make it appear that he had directly called for violence on January 6, 2021.

In a note to staff on Sunday afternoon, Davie said his resignation was “entirely my decision.” He added that as director general, he took “ultimate responsibility” for mistakes made by the BBC.

Turness said the controversy over a documentary made by the BBC’s “Panorama” series had “reached a stage where it is causing damage to the BBC – an institution that I love.”