Donald Trump says Keir Starmer doing ‘excellent job’

US President Donald Trump has stated Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has carried out a “excellent job to date” and that the pair have a “excellent relationship”.

Requested by the BBC on board Air Power One about his relationship with Sir Keir, Trump added that they might be having a name “over the subsequent 24 hours”.

Trump and the Labour chief have met on numerous events, together with a go to by Sir Keir to Trump Tower in New York in the course of the presidential marketing campaign.

Tech billionaire and Trump ally Elon Musk, nevertheless, has been strongly essential of Sir Keir and has repeatedly referred to as for his elimination from workplace.

“I get together with him properly. I like him rather a lot,” Trump stated of Sir Keir.

“He is liberal, which is a bit completely different from me, however I believe he is an excellent individual and I believe he is carried out an excellent job to date.

“He is represented his nation when it comes to philosophy.

“I could not agree along with his philosophy, however I’ve an excellent relationship with him.”

Trump was talking throughout a go to to the press room on board the presidential aircraft on Saturday.

He was requested about his relationship with Sir Keir after responding to a query about the place he would possibly go for the primary worldwide journey of his second time period.

“It might be Saudi Arabia, it might be UK. Historically it might be UK,” he stated.

“Final time I went to Saudi Arabia as a result of they agreed to purchase $450 billion of American United States merchandise.”

Sir Keir and Trump spoke by telephone following Trump’s re-election in November, with Downing Avenue saying on the time that the 2 had agreed the connection between the UK and US was “extremely sturdy” and would “proceed to thrive”.

Final week, International Secretary David Lammy stated Sir Keir would go to Washington for talks with Trump “inside the subsequent few weeks”.

A number of diplomatic challenges loom for the federal government, together with Trump’s pledges to introduce commerce tariffs and to chop US help for Ukraine.

It’s also unclear whether or not Trump will comply with the UK’s proposed deal to cede sovereignty over the Chagos Islands, the place there’s a joint US-UK army base, though the UK has stated the brand new US administration will likely be given the prospect to “think about” the deal.

There have been additional questions raised about whether or not Trump will settle for Sir Keir’s nomination of former Labour minister Lord Peter Mandelson because the British ambassador to Washington.

Final month, Chris LaCivita, the co-manager of Trump’s election marketing campaign, referred to as Lord Mandelson “an absolute moron” and stated he “ought to keep residence”.

Earlier this month Tesla boss Musk, who’s an adviser to the president, criticised Starmer in a collection of messages on his X social media platform over the grooming gangs scandal, saying the prime minister was “deeply complicit within the mass rapes in alternate for votes”.

In response, Sir Keir, who was director of public prosecutions between 2008 and 2013, has accused critics of “spreading lies and misinformation” and says he tackled prosecutions “head on”.

Lammy has described his personal criticism of the president, made when he was a backbencher, as “outdated information”.

In 2018 he described Trump as a “tyrant” and “a woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath” however the overseas secretary has since had dinner with him alongside the prime minister.