Starmer’s team is optimistic about building bridges with Trump — it has little choice
Between David Lammy’s ‘neo-Nazi’ comment and Labour staffers campaigning for Kamala Harris, the UK government has its work cut out to win the new president’s trust
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Donald Trump standing on the steps of the Capitol, being sworn in as US president for the second time, is a moment few in the political mainstream would have predicted. From impeachment trials to convictions on 34 felony charges, his return to the Oval Office marks one of the most extraordinary political comebacks in history. But as Trump gets settled in Washington, global politics is once again set to be anything but.
For Keir Starmer, this presents a defining challenge for his leadership. The “special relationship” between the UK and America is a cornerstone of British foreign policy; every British prime minister knows that their rapport with the US president can shape not only their time in Downing Street but also their legacy. Mostly, at least on the outside, presidents and prime ministers appear to get along regardless of ideological differences — Barack Obama and David Cameron were pictured sharing a beer, for example. Starmer and Trump, however, have not had the smoothest of starts.
Labour was in opposition the last time Trump was president. And during that period, Labour MPs were not exactly complimentary about his presidency. The foreign secretary, David Lammy, was a particularly vocal critic, once branding Trump a “woman-hating, neo-Nazi sympathising sociopath”. When I pressed Lammy on his comments during a recent ITV News interview, asking if his opinions had changed, he brushed them off as “ancient history”, pointing out that the two had shared meals during his last trip to Washington and that he was looking forward to working with the Trump administration. Lammy’s job hinges on a positive relationship with the White House and even before Starmer entered No 10 he had been working on building bridges. (Trump, for his part, appears willing to forgive those who have compared him to Nazis: his new vice-president JD Vance once said Trump could be “America’s Hitler”.)
Labour sources told me last year they could not be sure who they would have to work with, so extra effort was put in to court both Democrats and Republicans. There were frequent visits and regular meetings. This strategic engagement, however, hit rocky terrain during the presidential election campaign, when a LinkedIn post by a Labour staffer appealed for current and former party workers to travel to the US to campaign for Kamala Harris. Labour and the Democrats have long been viewed as sister parties, but the post caused quite the stir. Trump’s team filed a legal complaint with the Federal Election Commission, accusing Labour of foreign interference, while Starmer defended the post saying party staffers were doing it in their spare time and it was not official Labour party business.
X owner and Trump outrider Elon Musk seized the opportunity to fan the flames, accusing Labour of meddling — and continues to attack Starmer online, most recently over grooming gangs. Given Musk’s role in the Trump administration and the fact he appears to have the ear of the president, this could easily influence Starmer’s attempts to nurse the special relationship. Similarly, Vance has also been critical; he quipped that, under Labour, the UK had become the first “truly Islamist country to get a nuclear weapon”. Labour, of course, rejected this characterisation — but it is an indication that those closest to Trump are more than happy to go against usual political norms and openly criticise Starmer’s government.
Starmer’s team, though, remains outwardly confident. A senior source close to Starmer described meetings between the pair as constructive, and recently told me: “Trump respects strength, and he can see the majority that Keir has delivered.” A member of Starmer’s team said they believed that the prime minister’s experience as a lawyer and his ability to carefully make arguments in sensitive situations would come into its own. And a third Westminster insider told me that Starmer had been holding meetings with Lammy, chancellor Rachel Reeves and business secretary Jonathan Reynolds to discuss the best way to work with the Trump administration. Conversations were had about how to deal with the president’s unpredictable nature.
Starmer appears to have already had some experience of that. On a recent call between the two leaders, while the official read out said they discussed the “close and historic relation between the UK and the US”, reports later emerged of the finer details, which gave a more intriguing insight. While Starmer focused on defence and security issues, Trump reportedly wanted to talk about birds flying into wind turbines and his golf course in Scotland, and even described Starmer’s wife as his “greatest asset”. Trump, the rule breaker, and Starmer are clearly very different, both politically and personally. His positions — on the Paris climate agreement, tariffs, Ukraine — could easily be at odds with the UK government’s interests.
From the conversations I’ve had, there appears to be no naivety in Labour circles about this. To help navigate these turbulent waters, Starmer has tapped Peter Mandelson as his man in Washington. Mandelson is a seasoned political operator with plenty of experience to manage the complexities of the relationship — but like Lammy, his past criticism of Trump could pose challenges. The Independent has reported that the Trump camp is considering rejecting Mandelson — a move that would be totally unprecedented, but is technically possible, and would be one hell of a diplomatic insult. One Labour MP told me they thought the decision to appoint Mandelson in the first place was “risky at best and not very clever at worst”, and it could prove to be yet another bump in the road for Starmer’s attempts to build a functioning relationship.
Whatever happens, Starmer steps into this new era knowing his relationship with Trump will be hugely important. From the war in Ukraine to security agreements and trade, the stakes are high. Whether or not Starmer is able to navigate these waters successfully could easily define his time in No 10.
Shehab Khan is an award-winning presenter and political correspondent for ITV News.
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