UK election 2019: Donald Trump warns Boris Johnson over EU trade deal
Trump warns Johnson’s new Brexit deal could prevent the UK from trading with the US.
President Donald Trump has warned that Boris Johnson’s new Brexit deal could curtail new British trade with the US, in an intervention that threatens to undermine a key element of the UK Prime Minister’s election campaign.
Over the next six weeks, Mr Johnson must sell his deal to the Brexit voters who largely rejected Theresa May’s plans. He insists a key difference is that his version will give Britain more scope to strike free trade deals with America, which is touted as the main prospective new partner.
In an interview on Thursday night with UKIP founder Nigel Farage, however, Mr Trump said the revised agreement would still limit new trade between the two economies and could even stop it.
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Although he stopped short of endorsing Mr Farage’s statement that Mr Johnson would be better to “drop the deal” and opt for a “clean break” Brexit, he came close.
Mr Trump, in an extraordinary exchange with the arch-Eurosceptic on his LBC show, said that his “great friend” Mr Johnson was “in a very difficult position” when it came to trade with the EU and US.
“We’re far and away the largest economy in the world and we want to do trade with the UK and they want to do trade with us, and to be honest with you, this deal, under certain aspects of the deal, you can’t do it, you can’t do it, you can’t trade,” he said. “I mean we can’t make a trade deal with the UK and we can be, because I think we can do many times of numbers that we’re doing right now, and certainly much bigger numbers than you’re doing under the European Union.”
Although he did not expand, the US president is known to object to commitments within the withdrawal agreement that the UK will follow tough EU food rules that keep out many American agricultural goods.
However Mr Trump added that if there was a UK-US trade deal the trade would be four to five times higher than at present and make Britain much bigger economically than it is right now.
Mr Trump’s intervention in the first days of the British general election campaign, could work against Mr Johnson in other ways, too.
In a wide ranging interview, Mr Trump urged Mr Farage to join forces with Mr Johnson to defeat Labour who “would be so bad for your country’’.
But Mr Trump’s views will be seen as gross interference in another country’s elections and the Labour party has already complained.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn is likely to be thrilled at the bounce back, as the British are particularly sensitive to outsiders and Mr Trump has very low ratings in the UK.
Labour voters are unlikely to take any notice of Mr Trump’s views on Mr Corbyn, which included him saying: “Corbyn would be so bad for your country, he’ll be so bad, he’d take you in such a bad way. He’d take you into such bad places.’’
Mr Corbyn tweeted: “Donald Trump is trying to interfere in Britain’s election to get his friend Boris Johnson elected. “
Donald Trump is trying to interfere in Britain’s election to get his friend Boris Johnson elected.
— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) October 31, 2019
It was Trump who said in June the NHS is “on the tableâ€. And he knows if Labour wins US corporations won’t get their hands on it.
Our NHS is not for sale.pic.twitter.com/AUhht3pCgL
He then hit back at Mr Trump who had claimed he didn’t have any designs on the National Health System in a future UK-US trade deal. Mr Trump said: “It is not for us to have anything to do with your healthcare system,” Mr Trump said.
But Mr Corbyn said: “It was Trump who said in June the NHS is ‘on the table’. And he knows if Labour wins, US corporations won’t get their hands on it. Our NHS is not for sale.’’
Mr Trump told Mr Farage he was a “great tea leaf reader’’, urging: “I’d like to see you and Boris get together. Because you would really have some numbers, because you did fantastically in the last election”.
World Exclusive: I am speaking to President @realDonaldTrump on LBC. https://t.co/iu8TysJAgR
— Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) October 31, 2019
He added: “I have great relationships with many of the leaders, including Boris.
“He’s a fantastic man, and I think he’s the exact right guy for the times.
“I know that you and him will end up doing something terrific, if you and he get together. Unstoppable force.”
Mr Trump insisted that Mr Johnson respected Mr Farage. ”He respects you a lot, I can tell you that,” he said.
“He respects you a lot. I don’t know if you know that or not. I have enough to do over here without having to worry about the psychology of two brilliant people over there frankly.
“He has a lot of respect and like for you … I think it could be a great thing.”
The Brexit Party has yet to commit to standing candidates in Conservative party seats, which could split the first past the post vote and inadvertently help the Labour and Liberal Democrat opposition.
But Mr Johnson has not yet formed any pact with the Brexit Party, which wants a harder, cleaner Brexit with no deal with the European Union.
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