Keir Starmer secures first meeting with Donald Trump in NYC to ‘establish a relationship’
Keir Starmer secured his first meeting with Donald Trump on Thursday after having pushed for one with both presidential candidates in New York.
Keir Starmer secured his first meeting with Donald Trump (Image: GETTY)
He described the opportunity to meet with Mr Trump as “good”, adding he still hopes to meet Vice President Kamala Harris before the election in November.
He told journalists prior to meeting with the former president that he intended to use the meeting “to establish a relationship between the two of us.”
“I’m a great believer in personal relations on the international stage. I think it really matters that you know who your counterpart is in any given country, and know them you know personally, get to know them face to face.
So it’s really along those lines. I won’t go into what we’ll actually discuss, obviously, but that’s the purpose of it, as you’d expect, ahead of the election.
“I should probably add that, I mean that our camp, our embassy, has got good relations with both camps and has had for a long time.
“So it’s not the sort of start of something, it’s the continuation of those good relations that have been there with both camps, and that’s a really good thing that the embassy has been doing.”
Asked how he feels about the UK Prime Minister at a press conference this evening, President Trump joked: “Well I’m going to see him in about an hour so I have to be nice!”
“I actually think he’s very nice. He ran a great race, he did very well, it’s very early he’s very popular.”
Asked if he will be able to stand up to Donald Trump during disagreements should he win the White House, Sir Keir said that the special relationship between Britain and the US will “always sit above whoever holds the particular office”.
He argued that the special relationship is “probably as strong now as it has ever been” amid the wars in the Middle East and Ukraine.
He dodged whether he would repeat Theresa May’s habit of failing to stand up to the bullish former president, saying he won’t speculate on potential disagreements that may arise after the election.
Sir Keir and the Labour Party have had to make special efforts to forge ties with Mr Trump, given David Lammy’s hate-fuelled words about the then-president before becoming foreign secretary.
Donald Trump Campaigns Near Charlotte, NC (Image: Getty)
In 2018, Mr Lammy launched several verbal attacks on the then-President, writing that he is a “woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath”.
He continued: “He is also a profound threat to the international order that has been the foundation of Western progress for so long.”
However his views have since changed, saying in a speech earlier this year that he and Donald Trump could find “common cause”, suggesting that as a “good Christian boy” and “small-C conservative” he shared some Republican views.
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Labour civil war looms as Keir Starmer faces nightmare revolt from backbenchers
Discontent is said to be brewing among Labour backbenchers. (Image: Getty)
Sir Keir Starmer faces a growing rebellion among Labour backbenchers over his government’s Winter Fuel Payment raid and refusal – thus far – to scrap the Two Child Benefit Cap.
Telegraph journalist Suzanne Moore, who attended the party conference in Liverpool this week, said the “draconian discipline” Sir Keir has enforced means backbenchers without influence are left feeling “pretty demoralised”.
Labour figures are also concerned at increasingly being whipped to support policies they feel are at odds with the party’s core principles.
Rosie Duffield, a Labour MP who has been a vocal proponent of lifting the benefit cap told the outlet: “Every member of the cabinet has stood up at some point and made a comment against the two child limit.
“And suddenly we are in government and we don’t have the money to do anything about it? It’s so fundamental to who we are! This is one of the things that makes you think, why am I in the Labour Party? What’s the purpose of the Labour Party?”, she added.
Ms Duffield claimed the Prime Minister “just doesn’t engage,” adding that it’s often said Sir Keir is “not actually interested in politics”.
The policy, which limits child tax credit and universal credit to the first two children in most families, has come under fire for apparently exacerbating child poverty, a situation that Sir Keir has been urged to address.
Fears in Labour HQ of a major rebellion against the recent vote to cut the Winter Fuel Payment didn’t materialise, with the plan passing through Parliament easily.
However, “scores of MPs abstained in silent protest”, The Guardian reports, fearing that the move would condemn vulnerable pensioners to a cold, hard winter.
Ms Moore said there was “no mistaking an undercurrent of disappointment from many” who gathered in Merseyside this week to see Sir Keir’s first conference address since winning power in July.
Sir Keir gave his first speech to the party conference as Prime Minister this week. (Image: Getty)
“The new backbenchers are finding their way, not quite sure of their place, full of high ideals but in some ways already compromised,” she wrote.
“Does anyone really become a Labour MP to cut the winter fuel allowance? Of course there was going to be a rebellion on this and of course it would be ignored. Such is the power of a big majority.”
The Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, sparked a furious backlash in July when she announcedplans to limit winter fuel payments of up to £300 to only those on pension credit.
Labour have blamed cuts on having to tackle the £22 billion black hole in the public finances they claim the previous Conservative government left them, which the Tories deny.
The rule change, which will see some 10 million pensioners lose out on the payment, is expected to save the treasury around £1.3billion in the first year.
