Trump hints UK could avoid the sanctions he plans for EU during White House talks with Starmer – follow live | Politics

It turns out Keir Starmer ignored Steve Reed’s advice. (See 4.49pm.) When President Trump repeated his claim that Europeans are being repaid the money they have given Ukraine to help it fight Russia, Keir Starmer politely corrected him – just as Emmanuel Macron did on Monday.

Trump claimed he had a “very good relationship” with the Ukrainian leader, adding:

It maybe got a little bit testy because we wanted to have a little bit of what the European nations had. You know, they they get their money back by giving money, we don’t get the money back. Biden made a deal. He put in $350bn dollars and I thought it was a very unfair situation.

At that point Starmer intervened to say:

We’re not getting all of ours. I mean, quite a bit of ours was gifted. It was given. There were some loans, but mainly it was gifted actually.

Donald Trump has hinted that the UK may avoid the sort of swingeing tariffs that he has threatened to impose on the EU.

When it was put to him that he said yesterday the EU was constructed to “screw” the EU on trade, and when he was asked what Keir Starmer could say to him that would ensure that Britain did not face tariffs, Trump at first claimed not to have said that “bad word”.

He then launched into a long attack on the EU over trade policy, claiming that people thought it was “politically correct” to say the US’s trade relationship with the EU was good even thought it wasn’t.

Then, referring to the UK, he went on:

I can say that, we’re here for a different reason – we’re talking about a very different place. This is some place that I have investments there. I own Turnberry, I own Aberdeen, and I own a great place called Doonbeg in Ireland. So, I have a great warm spot for your country.

At this point Keir Starmer interrupted, saying:

And our trade, obviously, is fair and balanced and, in fact, you’ve got a bit of surplus. So, we’re in a different position there.

And obviously we contributed hugely in relation to Ukraine.

Trump then added: “It’s going to work out.”

Asked if he was saying that meant there would not be any sanctions on the UK, he replied:

Well, I have to take a look. We’re going to have a good discussion today, and we have some very talented people on the other side, and we have some people that probably aren’t as talented to them, but they’re pretty good. We’re going to have a good discussion, and we’ll be talking about it.

President Trump has declined to repeat his claim that President Zelenskyy is a dictator. The allegation is false, and prompted outrage in Europe when Trump made it, not least because he refuses to use that word to describe President Putin.

Asked if he still thought that, Trump replied:

Did I say that? I can’t believe I said that. Next question.

President Trump said that he thought a minerals deal with Ukraine would operate as a “backstop” (see 6.20pm) because Russia would not attack the country if American workers were on the ground working for companies involved in the extraction process. He explained.

President Zelenskyy is coming to see me on Friday, Friday morning, and we’re going to be signing really a very important agreement for both sides, because it’s really going to get us into that country.

It’s a backstop, you could say, I don’t think anybody’s going to play around if we’re there with a lot of workers and having to do with rare earths and other things which we need for our country.

PA Media has released extracts from King Charles’ letter to President Trump. Trump displayed the letter for the cameras, and so some of the wording was visible.

In the letter, the king invited the president to meet him in Scotland, either at Dumfries House or Balmoral, which are near Trump’s golf courses, ahead of a former state visit.

The letter, partially obscured by Trump’s hand, says:

I can only say that it would be … pleasure to extend that invitation once again, in the hope that you … some stage be visiting Turnberry and a detour to a relatively near neighbour might not cause you too much inconvenience. An alternative might perhaps be for you to visit Balmoral …

There is much on both estates which I think you might find interesting, and enjoy – particularly as my foundation at Dumfries House provides hospitality skills-training for young people who often end up as staff on your own establishments!

Quite apart from this presenting an opportunity to discuss a wide range of issues of mutual interest, it would also offer a valuable chance to plan a historic second state visit to the United Kingdom.

As you will know this is unprecedented by a US president. That is why I would find it helpful for us to be able to discuss, together, a range of options for location and programme content.

In so doing, working together, I know we will further enhance the special relationship between our two countries of which we are both so proud.

The letter was signed: “Yours Most Sincerely, Charles.”

Asked about Andrew Tate and his brother flying to the US, reportedly after the US urged Romania to lift the travel ban that was preventing them from leaving the countrty, Trump reportedly said he “doesn’t know anything about it”. And, according to the BBC, Starmer said he would need to catch up with the story before talking about it.

Donald Trump has claimed that his planned deal with Volodymyr Zelenskyy on minerals would effectively be a security “backstop”. He said:

President Zelenskyy is coming to see me on Friday morning. And we’re going be signing really a very important agreement for both sides because it’s really going to get us into that country, working there.

He added it was “a backstop, you could say”.

Trump is using the term because a “backstop” is the word that some Europeans have been using to describe the security guarantee they want from US to back up a European-led troop contingent, based in Ukraine, that could protect the country in the event of a peace deal.

But, although a minerals deal would notionally give the US some stake in Ukrainian stability, it is not the military backstop that Starmer and other European leaders want. (See 9.32am.)