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<\/div>\nSir Keir Starmer has said he “understands what anchors” US President Donald Trump, having built a relationship on shared family values.<\/p>\n
Despite “different political backgrounds” the prime minister said he found common ground with Trump, and that their “good personal relationship” helped land a vital US tariff deal.<\/p>\n
Speaking on BBC Radio 4’s Political Thinking programme, Sir Keir revealed Trump reached out to console him after the death of his younger brother Nick Starmer on Boxing Day.<\/p>\n
“For both of us, we really care about family and there’s a point of connection there,” he said.<\/p>\n
“I think I do understand what anchors the president, what he really cares about.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Sir Keir revealed he first spoke to Trump as prime minister after the then-presidential candidate was shot at a rally in July last year.<\/p>\n
“That was a phone call really to ask him how it was, and in particular I wanted to know how it impacted on his family,” he said.<\/p>\n
He added that Trump later called him after the death of his brother. <\/p>\n
“We talked about my brother, and he was asking about him,” Sir Keir said. <\/p>\n
Sir Keir denied this week’s painful series of U-turns on welfare reforms were because he had been too focused on foreign affairs and “taken his eye off the ball” domestically.<\/p>\n
On Tuesday, the government avoided defeat on its proposals to overhaul disability benefits by offering late concessions to Labour MPs threatening to rebel.<\/p>\n
The prime minister said he took responsibility for the episode, admitting it had been a “tough” few days but insisting the government would “come through this stronger” after a period of reflection.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
The prime minister said forging close ties with figures such as Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron were “always in the national interest”.<\/p>\n
“Building those relationships with international leaders is hugely important,” he said. <\/p>\n
The prime minister said the personal rapport had helped secure a deal removing UK industries from some of the sweeping tariffs announced by Trump.<\/p>\n
Before the deal he said he had seen “anxiety writ large” on the faces of British factory workers at Jaguar Land Rover in Solihull.<\/p>\n
“After the deal, the relief was palpable,” he said. <\/p>\n
Sir Keir said discussions “over a glass of wine” with Macron on a train to Kyiv had also paved the way for a new agreement with the EU, which he claimed would lead to lower food prices in British supermarkets. <\/p>\n
“That is a good thing for millions of people across the country,” he said.<\/p>\n
Sir Keir is due to meet Macron again next week as the French president comes to the UK for a state visit.<\/p>\n
Tackling small boat crossings will be a key point of discussion, after Downing Street said last month the situation in the English Channel was “deteriorating”.<\/p>\n
Official figures released this week showed nearly 20,000 people arrived in the UK in the first half of this year by crossing the Channel in small boats – up 48% on the same period last year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Published at Fri, 04 Jul 2025 05:00:04 +0000<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I understand what Trump cares about, says Starmer Sir Keir Starmer has said he “understands what anchors” US President Donald Trump, having built a relationship on shared family values. Despite “different political backgrounds” the prime minister said he found common ground with Trump, and that their “good personal relationship” helped land a vital US tariff… Continue reading I understand what Trump cares about, says Starmer<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3659,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uk-politics","entry"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/260web.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/260web.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/260web.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/260web.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/260web.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/260web.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3660\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/260web.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3659"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/260web.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/260web.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/260web.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}