Donald Trump’s mockery of Keir Starmer shows the Prime Minister isn’t respected on the world stage, Reform UK’s Robert Jenrick suggested today.
At a White House lunch on Wednesday, the US President put on a weak-sounding voice as he mimicked Sir Keir saying he couldn’t send UK forces to the Middle East.
Mr Trump said he had asked if Britain could send its ‘two, old, broken down aircraft carriers’ to help open up the Strait of Hormuz.
According to Mr Trump, Sir Keir replied: ‘No, no, no, I have to ask my team. My team has to meet, we’re meeting next week.’
‘By that point the war might be over,’ the US President told the audience in Washington DC, as he spoke about America’s ongoing conflict with Iran.
It is the latest in a string of snide comments from Mr Trump about the PM and Britain’s military capabilities as his increasingly-disastrous war stretches on.
Responding to the US President’s latest attack on Sir Keir, Mr Jenrick, Reform’s Treasury spokesman, said he didn’t like to see foreign leaders ‘berating’ Britain’s PM.
But he said it showed how Mr Trump and Sir Keir’s relationship was now ‘irreparably’ broken.
Mr Jenrick told LBC on Friday morning: ‘I don’t like to see foreign leaders berating the leader of the UK, regardless of which party he or she is.
‘You want our Prime Minister to be somebody who is respected on the world stage and is treated with respect by our main ally, so I don’t like that.
‘The relationship between Keir Starmer and Donald Trump has clearly taken a massive blow, probably irreparably so.
‘Part of that is the fact that the Prime Minister initially chose not to make our bases available to the US for this action.
‘But I’m not here to defend Donald Trump or the way he conducts himself, far from it.’
Iran has effectively shut down Strait of Hormuz, a key shipping lane in the Gulf, in retaliation for US and Israeli attacks that began at the end of February.
The closure of the vital sea passage has caused shipments of oil and gas to grind to a halt and sent global energy prices soaring.
Mr Jenrick on Friday put pressure on Mr Trump to end the Middle East conflict ‘as quickly as possible’ as he warned about the damaging effects of the war on Brits.
He told GB News: ‘We want this war to come to an end, it’s having a massive impact on people’s livelihoods here in the UK.
‘Reform is the party for working people – not for foreign wars in distant parts of the world. So our message to the US is to bring this war to a close as quickly as possible.
‘It seems clear to me the Prime Minister has little if any influence, no influence on events elsewhere in the world.
‘He’s praising himself, patting himself on the back that he blocked the US from using our bases initially, only to predictably U-turn.
‘But what difference has that made to people here when they see fuel rising on the forecourts, or their energy bills are… so much higher than they were expecting?
‘What we have got to see is the war come to an end.’
Should the UK take a tougher stance with the US over disagreements like this?
Mr Trump’s remarks about Sir Keir on Wednesday were recorded on a live stream.
The private event was closed to the press however, for unknown reasons, a recording of the live stream appears to have been uploaded to YouTube by the White House.
The recording was downloaded by Bryan Metzger, a senior politics reporter for US website Business Insider, who posted the whole thing on X.
After he had done this, the White House made the recording private on YouTube, meaning it was not accessible to the public any more.
When the Daily Mail contacted the White House for comment, our reporter asked about the President’s remarks about Sir Keir at a ‘White House lunch’ on Wednesday.
A spokesperson for the President, Anna Kelly, did not dispute that he had made the remarks, or that they were made at the lunch.
She said: ‘President Trump has made his disappointment with the United Kingdom and other NATO allies clear, and as the President emphasized: ‘The United States will remember’.’
The President has been angry with Sir Keir for weeks for refusing to let US airplanes use British bases for sorties over Iran.
Sir Keir has since changed his mind but has refused to send British troops and ships to the Strait of Hormuz, which carries 20 percent of the world’s oil.
Its closure is causing petrol prices to spike amid warnings from analysts it could cause an oil shock worse than the 1970s.
Speaking on Wednesday, Sir Keir once again refused Mr Trump’s requests and said that ‘this is not our war’, adding: ‘We will not be drawn into the conflict.’
Mr Trump’s frustration boiled over hours later at the White House lunch.
The President drew a comparison between the Prime Minister and King Charles, who is due to make a state visit to Washington later this month.
Mr Trump told the audience: ‘I asked UK who should be our best (ally).
‘The King is coming over here in two weeks, he’s a nice guy, King Charles.
‘(Britain) should be our best but they weren’t our best.
‘I said (to Sir Keir) you have two, old broken down aircraft carriers, do you think you could send them over?’
Putting on a weak-sounding voice, Mr Trump said: ‘(Sir Keir said) Ohhh I’ll have to ask my team.
‘I said you’re the Prime Minister, you don’t have to.
‘(Sir Keir said) No, no, no, I have to ask my team. My team has to meet, we’re meeting next week.
‘(I said) but the war already started. Next week the war’s going to be over…in three days, my prediction.’
Britain is seeking to lead a diplomatic initiative, including countries such as France, Germany and some Gulf nations, to unblock the Strait of Hormuz.
Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper on Thursday held talks with more than 40 nations from across the world on efforts to reopen the vital waterway.
She said collective action to increase pressure on Tehran was being discussed as she accused the country of trying to ‘hold the global economy hostage’ with its stranglehold on the key trade route.
After chairing the video call, Ms Cooper ducked a question on whether Washington was still an ally.
She told broadcasters: ‘We want to see the conflict resolved, concluded, as rapidly as possible, because, frankly, that’s what’s best for the cost of living here in the UK.’
In his remarks at the White House, Mr Trump also mocked French President Emmanuel Macron, who has also refused to send warships to open the Strait of Hormuz.
The President said Mr Macron was ‘still recovering from the right to the jaw’ and claimed that his wife, Brigitte Macron, ‘treats him extremely badly’.
The comment referenced a video from May last year when the Macrons visited Vietnam that appeared to show Mrs Macron pushing her husband’s face seconds before they disembarked from their plane.
In response to comments, Mr Macron said: ‘Trump talks too much. His remarks are neither elegant nor up to the standard’.
