My 3 kids think dads should be embarrassing.. and that I am overachieving
With Paychecks festival in Texas to Trump’s favourite Mar- a- Lago resort in Florida. “Trump plays this fear card about the wall to stop illegals coming over,” says Ed. “The rhetoric around Muslims is shocking. We were in Mar-alargo and two or three people said to me in the first hour ‘ You’re from London, is it safe? Isn’t it over-run by terrorists?’. “When you talk to the working class, it’s less about fear. “I was surprised how immigration was less of an economic issue than you would find in the UK. It was more about hope – what Trump offers is hope and change. You see the wrestler Johnny Slaughter saying the people you want to be president don’t become president and this is this best we can get.
“The thing people said is Trump is not in it for the money. I say ‘So you think Obama was?’ and they say absolutely. Bush, Bush Jnr as well.”
Ed believes it was a man who never voted before the last election who best explained Trump’s appeal. He told him: “All my life, there are Democrats who broke promises, Republican presidents that break promises, then it’s a Democrat again and suddenly this guy comes along and the Democrats and the Republicans are both against him – and if they’re all against him maybe it’s worth giving him a try.”
In the first episode, Ed stays at a farm with veterans and joins them for a toast to friends who lost their lives.
He asks them to toast Labour MP Jo Cox, murdered by a far-right extremist in her Batley and Spen constituency a
After 2 days of being jumped on by a very big man they opened up
week before the EU referendum. “The only thing which felt comparable to me was Jo, who I knew very well,” Ed says.
“Jo losing her life is a terrible thing, but I’m somebody who has three kids, and a partner who does exactly the same kind of surgeries every Friday, so it could have been us. I could both think about what it’s like to be Jo but also what it’s like to be her family.”
The show is timely, coming soon after Trump’s first official visit to the UK.
“I thought he’d become a more reasonable, centrist president but he hasn’t,” says Ed. But does he want to get back into the political arena? “I’m regretful politics is so chaotic and I look back at better times wistfully,” he says.
“But if you said to me, ‘ You could be in Parliament or you could do this show at the moment’, I’d choose this show.”
Travels In Trumpland With Ed Balls starts on BBC2 at 9pm on Sunday.