When Air Force One touches down on British soil this week, President Donald Trump will have much to celebrate. Trump, a man whose fondness for pomp, ceremony, and being lavished with attention is legendary, will become the first American President to get a second state visit.
For a president determined to secure honours equal to or exceeding his predecessors, that achievement will be a triumph. But Trump, a longtime anglophile who also takes great pride in his Scottish golf courses, has more to celebrate than that: Trump arrives in Britain at a time when it is dominated by American-style politics.
Most British adults had not heard of Charlie Kirk before his assassination in Utah last week (though their teenage children almost certainly had). Despite this, and despite the near-total absence of solid information on the suspect’s motivations, Kirk’s slaying has already become a cause célèbre of the UK’s right – as well as fuelling a debate on his character between those who have just heard of him as a champion of free expression, and those aware of his more complex and divisive record.
Kirk has become the latest figurehead of a pan-European free speech row stoked by America, including directly by Donald Trump’s administration. Vice President JD Vance used his first address to European leaders, at the Munich Security Conference, to warn against European norms on free speech – and to effectively impose American ones.
It is a common claim among the online right in America that the UK is some free speech dystopia, often based on the claim that around 1,000 people a month are arrested over social media posts – an astounding claim that is actually true, though which leaves out the context that most of the arrests lead to no further action, and the remainder almost entirely to cautions.
The American right is convinced that the streets of London are deadly, despite them being vastly safer than even the safest big American city, and fixates on its Muslim mayor as if he’s a radical, rather than a generally liked liberal who has often led the city’s Pride parades. The UK’s rules on protests outside abortion clinics are a frequent topic of online discourse there, too.
All of this bounced back into UK politics, often in toxic ways. The US and UK right have financial ties and regularly boost one another online and in person – British influencers speak at well-funded American conferences, and US MAGA figures are stars among the British mainstream right, courted by Nigel Farage, Robert Jenrick and other leaders.
Trump might be remarkably unpopular among the wider British public, but as he arrives in the country, he can be reassured that he is reshaping the country’s politics in its own image – more polarised, angrier, with more people of all factions taking to the streets. The President will be walking into a political atmosphere that will feel extremely familiar to him. As he walks through gilded surroundings, everything beyond smoulders.
The UK has long been sheltered from the extremes of American politics by the institutions that bring us together – such as so many of us getting our news from the BBC, and so having some shared sense of what is going on. As more of us turn to the internet as our primary source of information, that protection is being lost, and we are becoming as divided as our cousins across the Atlantic.
The influence Trump’s America is having on Britain extends well beyond these cultural issues, and even beyond the polarising political climate – not least because Donald Trump requires them to do so.
The UK government was extremely proud to be one of the first nations to sign a new “trade deal” with the USA to soften the impact of Trump’s tariffs on our economy, but months later, that deal is not yet fully in force. Sources I’ve spoken to suggest that this week the UK will give a tacit agreement we won’t regulate US tech companies – including on speech issues – too aggressively, and in return the trade deal will finally come into force. The US, in other words, is dictating domestic British policy, and the Government feels it has little choice but to let them do so.
square JAMES BALL Charlie Kirk's killing has shown Trump up as the self-serving hypocrite he is
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The UK government is also facing the thorny question of what to do about Elon Musk, another importer of culture wars to the UK. Musk spoke at Tommy Robinson’s rally on Saturday, calling for the dissolution of parliament, accusing them of acting “against the people” and telling Brits to “fight back” against alleged impending violence.
Last year, he said that “civil war is inevitable” in Britain, criticising its “tyrannical police state”, re-posting (and later deleting) fake news about the far-right riots which took place. Any countermeasures against Musk will have to be balanced against pushback from Trump and the White House, who have their own complex relationship with the X owner.
In the early days of this second term of his presidency, Trump spoke ambitiously of expanding the USA and adding to its territory – perhaps Canada should join, maybe Greenland, or even Panama. But the UK, oddly, was never in the mix.
As Trump arrives this week to survey a country increasingly riven by politics in his image, the answer becomes clear: Trump doesn’t need to talk about annexing the UK, because he’s effectively done it already. Welcome to the 51st state, Mr President.
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