We love your country... Trump’s Brexit trade boost for Britain
PM MEETS THE PRESIDENT IN DAVOS
DONALD Trump is set to make his long-awaited first presidential visit to the UK later this year, it was announced yesterday.
The US President met with Prime Minister Theresa May to discuss the trip, with Mr Trump telling her: “We love your country and we will always fight for you.”
The two leaders were at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where they set out to re-establish the “special relationship” between their countries after a series of rifts.
The President also boosted UK hopes for post-Brexit prosperity by forecasting a “tremendous” increase in trade between the two nations.
Prospect
The prospect of Mr Trump’s first official visit was confirmed by a Downing Street spokesman, who said: “The Prime Minister and President concluded by asking officials to work together on finalising the details of a visit by the President to the UK later this year.”
It is as yet unknown if Mr Trump’s planned trip – understood to have been raised at the end of the meeting – will have the status of a full state visit or be a lower key working trip.
A senior Government source said: “Officials will talk about what type of visit it’s going to be.”
The news followed a public row last November when Mrs May rebuked Mr Trump for sharing online anti-Muslim videos posted by a racist British group, before he told her on Twitter to focus on “radical Islamic terrorism in the UK” and not on him.
There are also claims he cancelled a visit next month to open the new US embassy in London because he felt the British Government had not shown him “enough love”.
But an invitation remains for him to make a full state visit to the UK, which Mrs May issued a year ago – officially on the Queen’s behalf – when she met him at the White House after his inauguration. Yesterday, the two leaders addressed the media together.
President Trump said: “We have had a great discussion. We’re on the same wavelength in every respect.
“We have had a really great relationship, although some people don’t necessarily believe that.
“But I can tell you I have a tremendous respect for the Prime Minister and the job she’s doing and I think the feeling is mutual from the standpoint of liking each other a lot. There was a little bit of a false rumour out there and I just wanted to correct it.” He told Mrs May: “We have great respect for everything you are doing and we love your country, we think it’s truly great.
“We have the same ideas, the same ideals, and there’s nothing that would happen to you that we won’t be there to fight for you. You know that.”
He added: “The trade concepts and discussions that will be taking place are going to lead to tremendous increases in trade between our two countries which is great for both in terms of jobs.”
Earlier, Mr Trump’s Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said the President was clear Britain would be “at the front of the line” for a trade deal with the US once it was ready to negotiate.
Mrs May agreed they had held a “great discussion”. She said: “We continue to have that really special relationship between the UK and the US, standing shoulder to
shoulder because we are facing the same challenges across the world.
“And, as you say, we are working together to defeat those challenges and to meet them.
“And, alongside that, working for a good trade relationship in the future which will be to both our benefits. So the UK and the US both do well out of this.”
Mrs May also told reporters last night Britain will be an even better place to do business after Brexit.
The Prime Minister insisted she was “positive” about her Government agreeing an EU trade deal that will include financial services.
She insisted the City of London will remain “a global financial centre” and the UK will become “an even more attractive place for financial services” after the country quits the EU.
But she risked angering Eurosceptic campaigners and MPs by repeatedly refusing to rule out Britain paying Brussels for access to the European single market.
Special
Mrs May said: “I’m very clear that we want to develop a deep and special partnership, a comprehensive free trade agreement.
“Obviously, we recognise the importance of financial services and we want to ensure that we can continue to see those financial services, ensuring that the City of London retains its role as a global financial centre.
“In the past few weeks, I’ve been talking to financial services businesses in the UK, as I have done previously, and they are positive about the advantages the UK has.
“I want to build on those, to make the United Kingdom an even more attractive place for financial services to be.”
Pressed on whether Britain will continue to contribute to the Brussels budget to maintain single market access, she said: “One of the things that we agreed and discussed in the first phase of negotiations and came to an agreement in December was on the financial settlement of the UK’s withdrawal from the European Union.
“We are now going into the second phase, which is about the basis on which we are going to be able to trade in goods and services.
“On all of these areas, I’m positive that we will be able to get a good arrangement for the future, an arrangement which is a comprehensive trade agreement for the United Kingdom with the European Union.” She added: “And I’m positive about the future for the City of London.”
AT A snowy mountain retreat the handshake is warm and the words are red hot. When President Trump met Theresa May in Davos yesterday, it was obvious that the special relationship between our countries remains very special indeed.
“We’re very much joined at the hip,” the President told the Prime Minister. “We’re on the same wavelength I think in every respect.
“We have the same ideas, the same ideals and there’s nothing that would happen to you that we won’t be there to fight for you.”
Mark those words well, for in a troubled world they are our strongest safeguard. But it is not just in military terms that the Americans are our greatest allies.
Earlier the United States confirmed it will negotiate an “attractive” trade deal the moment we leave the EU.
The puffed-up Mayor of London Sadiq Khan may kid himself he’s speaking for Britain when he gloats over President Trump’s cancelled visit to our country but he does not.
He speaks only for those on the Left who put political posturing above security and prosperity.
Long may the strongest friendship in the world continue. We are proud to stand shoulder to shoulder with our American allies.