What to expect from Trump’s U.K. trip
President Trump’s second state visit to the UK kicks off today, tied to commemorations of the 75th anniversary of the D-Day invasion.
The trip will start with plenty of traditional British pomp and circumstance with the royal family. Then Trump will sit down for lunch with Prime Minister Theresa May.
But May’s stepping down as head of the British government this Friday, making this a bad time to talk politics, according to Scott Lucas, who teaches international relations at the University of Birmingham in the UK.
“Brexit has been so chaotic and so dysfunctional that the UK is not in any position to really be discussing trade deals with the Americans at this point,” he said.
When Trump meets with May, he’ll push his agenda, said Jeremy Shapiro, research director at the European Council on Foreign Relations. “To encourage the UK to leave the EU, and then he wants to create a bilateral deal which would be very favorable to the United States,” he said.
It’s a deal that would take a little bit of diplomacy and a lot of coordination, according to Shapiro, both of which are lacking right now.
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