Donald Trump says ‘great to be home’ after landing in Scotland for golf visit
Donald Trump said it was “great to be home” as he arrived in Scotland to cut the ribbon on another golf course near Aberdeen.
The first former US president to be charged with a crime said on Truth Social, the social media platform he owns, that he was going to the Menie estate near Aberdeen to open a second course.
Trump and his son Eric arrived at Aberdeen airport at about 11.30am on Monday and were met by two pipers, a red carpet and a 10-vehicle motorcade.
Before getting into one of the cars, he said: “It’s great to be home, this was the home of my mother.”
Trump’s mother, Mary, was born on the Isle of Lewis in the Outer Hebrides and emigrated to the US.
Trump’s visit came as he attempted to have a civil case in which he is accused him of rape and defamation thrown out.
In a letter filed on Monday in Manhattan federal court, Trump’s lawyer Joe Tacopina cited several alleged errors by the judge, including what he said was mischaracterisation of the evidence in the claimant E Jean Carroll’s favour and interference with his ability to defend his client.
After his time in Scotland, Trump will head to his golf course in Doonbeg on Ireland’s west coast.
Despite the visit, Trump, who is running for the White House again in 2024 and is seen by many as the presumptive Republican nominee, said his campaign was “on my mind”, stressing a victory for him would make America “greater than ever before”.
“Will be leaving for Scotland & Ireland soon in order to see and inspect my great properties there,” he wrote. “The golf courses and hotels are among the greatest in the world – Turnberry and Aberdeen in Scotland, and Doonbeg in Ireland.
“Will be meeting with many wonderful friends, and cutting a ribbon for a new and spectacular second course in Aberdeen. Very exciting despite the fact that it is ‘make America great again’ that is on my mind, in fact, America will be greater than ever before.”
On Monday, Tacopina claimed he should have been allowed to question Carroll about why she did not seek security camera footage of the alleged rape, and argued that the judge impeded his ability to question her on why she did not go to the police. Trump has consistently maintained that the alleged rape never happened.
Meanwhile, Trump also faces legal trouble in his native New York over his business practices. He has pleaded not guilty to charges of falsifying business records in order, it is alleged, to hide damaging information before the 2016 presidential election.
The charges stem from payments made to the adult film star Stormy Daniels, who said she had a sexual encounter with Trump in 2006, a year after he married his third wife, Melania. They also stem from payments to a Playboy model, Karen McDougal, who wanted to sell her story of an affair with Trump; and to a former Trump Tower doorperson, who claimed the former president fathered a child out of wedlock.
Meanwhile, the US justice department has investigations under way in relation to his actions in the 2020 election, including lies that led to the January 6 insurrection and his retention of highly classified documents after he left the White House in 2021. Both are overseen by Jack Smith, a war crimes prosecutor and political independent.
Trump previously spent two days at his Turnberry course while in office in 2018, meeting the then prime minister, Theresa May, and the queen during the visit.
Asked last week whether he would meet Trump, who has made contro
versial statements about Muslims in the past, Scotland’s first minister, Humza Yousaf, said: “I would find it difficult, I have to say, to meet with him without raising the significance of concerns I have of the remarks that he’s made in the past.”