Breaking all normal diplomatic conventions, Donald Trump has blasted his host, British Prime Minister Theresa May, in an interview published shortly after May rolled out the red carpet at Blenheim Palace for the US president’s first official visit to Britain.
In the explosive interview with the British tabloid Sun published on Thursday night, Trump disparaged May’s compromise, pro-business plan to leave the European Union and warned that her approach could imperil any future trade deal between the US and UK, saying the prime minister’s Brexit plan is going “the opposite way.”
“If they do a deal like that, we would be dealing with the European Union instead of dealing with the UK, so it will probably kill the deal,” he told the Sun.
He said that Prime Minister May ignored his advice on Brexit negotiations with the EU. “I would have done it much differently. I actually told Theresa May how to do it, but she didn’t listen to me.”
At the Blenheim Palace dinner held in Trump’s honour on Thursday evening, May lavished praise on the US president and her country’s special relationship with America.
And, she vowed to “tear down” the bureaucratic barriers that the EU had put in the path of business, and promised to overcome American fears about her new Brexit plan.
“Now, as we prepare to leave the European Union, we have an unprecedented opportunity to do more. It’s an opportunity to reach a free trade agreement that creates jobs and growth here in the UK and right across the United States,” she told Trump.
“It’s also an opportunity to tear down the bureaucratic barriers that frustrate business leaders on both sides of the Atlantic. And it’s an opportunity to shape the future of the world through cooperation in advanced technology, such as artificial intelligence,” she added.
But Trump’s dismissive remarks threatened to undermine her desperate attempts to placate angry Tory leavers by winning US support for her so-called soft Brexit plan. – Press TV.
