UK-US trade to grow ‘substantially’ after Brexit, says Trump
DONALD Trump has predicted trade between the US and UK will increase “very substantially” after Britain’s departure from the European Union.
The President, speaking at the White House, said: “We’re agreeing to go forward and preserve our trade agreement.
“You know all of the situation with respect to Brexit and the complexity and the problems, but we have a very good trading relationship with the UK and that’s just been strengthened further.
“So with the UK we’re continuing our trade and we’re going to actually be increasing it very substantially as time goes by.
“We expect that the UK will be very, very substantially increased as it relates to trade with the United States. The relationship there also is very good.”
Last year Mr Trump dealt the Prime Minister’s Brexit deal a blow by suggesting it could hinder the ability of the UK to trade with the US.
His latest comments were wel-
Business: Donald Trump
comed by International Trade Secretary Liam Fox, who said: “President Trump’s statement was clear — the UK and the USA share a special trade relationship and there is real ambition on both sides of the Atlantic to enhance this after we leave the European Union.”
Meanwhile, Mr Trump has announced he will declare a national emergency to fulfil his pledge to build a wall along the US-Mexico border.
He said he will use executive powers to bypass Congress, which approved far less money for his proposed wall than he had sought. He plans to siphon billions of dollars from federal military construction and counter-drug efforts for the wall.
The move is already drawing bipartisan criticism on Capitol Hill and is expected to face rounds of legal challenges.
“I am going to be signing a national emergency,” Mr Trump said as he claimed illegal immigration marked “an invasion of our country”.
In a rare show of bipartisanship, legislators voted yesterday to fund large swathes of the government and avoid a repeat of this winter’s debilitating fiveweek government shutdown.
The money in the Bill for border barriers, about $1.4bn (£1.1bn), is far below the $5.7bn (£4.4bn) Mr Trump insisted he needed and would finance just a quarter of the 200-plus miles he wanted this year. To bridge the gap, he said he will spend roughly $8bn (£6.2bn) on border barriers, combining the money approved by Congress with funding he plans to repurpose through executive actions, including the national emergency.