Keir Starmer denies he was too left-wing to get on with Donald Trump – as his Government faces extra embarrassment over Labour MPs’ controversial feedback concerning the US president-elect

On Nov 8, 2024

Published: 01:56, 8 November 2024 | Updated: 03:02, 8 November 2024

Sir Keir Starmer last night denied he was too left-wing to get on with Donald Trump as the Government faced more embarrassment over Labour MPs’ previous comments about the returning President.

The Prime Minister insisted they had a positive phone call after this week’s election and that the special relationship between the UK and US is more important than ever.

He was asked by reporters at the European Political Community summit in Hungary yesterday about claims that Mr Trump had privately described him as ‘very left-wing’, suggesting relations between the administrations would be strained.

Sir Keir replied: ‘I had a very good meeting with President Elect Trump a few weeks ago when we had dinner in New York. It was very positive and constructive, as was the phone call we had last night.

‘As I’ve said many, many times, the special relationship was forged in very difficult circumstances historically. In our joint view, it’s more important today than it’s ever been.’

Sir Keir Starmer (pictured) last night denied he was too left-wing to get on with Donald Trump

The Prime Minister insisted he and Donald Trump (pictured) had a positive phone call after this week’s election

In another attempt to build bridges, his deputy Angela Rayner spoke to incoming Vice President JD Vance – after it emerged she once described Mr Trump as an ‘absolute buffoon’ who has ‘no place in the White House‘.

Newly unearthed footage shows that during the pandemic, she told ITV: ‘He’s an absolute buffoon. He has no place in the White House. He’s an embarrassment and he should be ashamed of himself, especially when thousands of Americans have died.’

Last night Ms Rayner wrote on Twitter/X: ‘Good to speak to US Vice President-elect JD Vance as UK Deputy Prime Minister. We spoke about our plans for the future and how, working together, we build on the special relationship between our great countries.’

Earlier a Cabinet minister repeatedly refused to say if he thought Mr Trump had Nazi sympathies.

Pat McFadden dodged the question three times and insisted that insults levelled at Mr Trump by senior Labour figures would not derail the special relationship between the UK and the US.

A number of Labour MPs now in Government hurled insults at Mr Trump during his first term in office, including David Lammy – now Foreign Secretary – who once wrote online: ‘He is a racist KKK and Nazi sympathiser.’

Yesterday, Cabinet Office minister Mr McFadden was reminded of his colleague’s remarks and asked how it would affect the relationship between the UK and US but claimed: ‘I think we’ll get on well actually.’

He denied that Mr Trump would bear a grudge against Mr Lammy, telling LBC that even some of his closest allies such as running mate JD Vance and tech tycoon Elon Musk had been highly critical of him in the past.

A number of Labour MPs now in Government hurled insults at Mr Trump during his first term in office, including David Lammy (pictured) – now Foreign Secretary

The Prime Minister said that the special relationship between the UK and US is more important than ever

‘He is capable of looking past these things. And I think there’s a bigger point that we can miss in reading this these things out, which is that the alliance and the friendship between the United States and the United Kingdom is really deep and enduring.’

Asked if he thought Mr Trump has KKK sympathies or Nazi sympathies, the minister refused to answer directly.

He said instead: ‘What I think is important is this friendship between the two countries. I congratulate him on his win and we look forward to working with him.’

In a separate interview with GB News he said the ‘friendship and the alliance between the United States and the UK is really deep and long-lasting’ and is ‘far more important than tweets on either side of the pond’.

A ‘Neo-Nazi sympathiser’ and a ‘sad little man’: The rash comments about Trump that Labour ministers are trying to forget

KEIR STARMER

Last year, Sir Keir compared the Conservative Party with Mr Trump as he accused the Tories of falling far from Churchillian values.

‘Is there anybody in the Government now who feels a sense of obligation to anything other than their own self-interest? To democracy, the rule of law, serving our country?’ he asked in a speech in Buckinghamshire.

‘An entitlement to power totally unchecked by any sense of service or responsibility – that’s the cultural stain that runs through the modern Conservative Party.’

He added: ‘These aren’t Churchill’s Tories any more. If anything they behave more and more like Donald Trump. They look at the politics of America and they want to bring that here.

‘It’s all woke, woke, woke. Wedge, wedge, wedge. Divide, divide, divide.’

In June, the prime minister said following Mr Trump’s hush money trial conviction that it was an ‘unprecedented situation’.

‘We will work with whoever is elected president … that’s what you’d expect,’ Sir Keir said.

‘We have a special relationship with the US that transcends whoever the president is, but it is an unprecedented situation, there is no doubt about that.’

In the lead up to this year’s US presidential election, Sir Keir maintained that the Government will work with whoever is president.

FOREIGN SECRETARY DAVID LAMMY

In 2017, Mr Lammy called Mr Trump a ‘racist and KKK/neo-Nazi sympathiser’.

A year later, the Tottenham MP wrote in Time magazine that he would be protesting against the then-government’s ‘capitulation to this tyrant in a toupee’, in reference to Mr Trump’s first official visit to the UK.

‘Trump is not only a woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath,’ Mr Lammy wrote, ‘he is also a profound threat to the international order that has been the foundation of Western progress for so long.’

Asked about his past comments earlier this year, Mr Lammy said: ‘Where I can find common cause with Donald Trump, I will find common cause’.

He offered his congratulations to Mr Trump on Wednesday morning, saying: ‘We look forward to working with you and @JDVance in the years ahead.’

DEPUTY PM ANGELA RAYNER

Ms Rayner has publicly criticised Mr Trump more than once in posts on X, formerly Twitter.

On the day of the Capitol Hill riots in 2021, she tweeted: ‘The violence that Donald Trump has unleashed is terrifying, and the Republicans who stood by him have blood on their hands.’

Later in January that year, Ms Rayner said of the inauguration of Joe Biden as president: ‘I am so happy to see the back of Donald Trump, but even more so to see @KamalaHarris as VP.’

HEALTH SECRETARY WES STREETING

In 2017, Mr Streeting called Trump an ‘odious, sad little man’ in a post on X.

‘Imagine being proud to have that as your president,’ he added.

Asked on Tuesday about the social media post, the Health Secretary told Good Morning Britain: ‘The Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary have been working hard to build a relationship with President Trump and his team, so that in the event that he is elected as the next president of the United States, we start with the strong working relationship which is in our national interest and in the interests of the United States as well.’

ENERGY SECRETARY ED MILIBAND

Mr Miliband labelled Mr Trump a ‘groper’ and a ‘racist’ in November 2016.

‘The idea that we have shared values with a racist, misogynistic, self-confessed groper beggars belief,’ Mr Miliband told the BBC.

‘And I think we should be deeply worried about the implications for many of the things that we care about. Tackling climate change – he says it’s invented by the Chinese, climate change, it’s a hoax. His attitude to Russia.

‘And then this fantasy about trade. I mean, this guy is anti-trade. He’s an odd combination of protectionism, plus the old trickle-down formula that has got us into a lot of this mess in the first place.’