02 Jun Rhetorical Distance, Structural Depth: UK–US Ties in the Trump–Starmer Era

Last month, Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced a trade agreement between the UK and the United States to great fanfare. One of his “hat trick” of agreements, alongside the EU and India, it was mostly legally non-binding and without input from either side’s legislative branches. It did, however, serve three main purposes:

1. Appease President Trump’s strong desire for the optics of a trade agreement

2. Soften the sharper edges of Trump’s new tariff regime through carveouts for certain British businesses

3. And perhaps most importantly for the UK side, provide some covering fire for the increasingly wide rhetorical divergence between the US and the UK on key foreign policy issues, such as the conflicts in Ukraine and Israel/Palestine.

Although Starmer has spent the first year of his premiership focused on strengthening European resolve and support for Ukraine during a period of change in the White House, he has made far less noise about his stance on the Israel-Palestine conflict, and for good reason. Much of his party membership, voting base, and parliamentary party – including current Ministers – are pro-Palestine, but many of his Western allies, and security and foreign affairs institutions, are at least softly pro-Israel. There is also a very strong pro-Israeli President returned to the White House.

However, as most in Westminster begin to think about Party conference season, the only time of the year where Labour can replace its Leader, and where I led the US embassy’s political engagement for six years, for any attendees it always becomes quickly apparent how important the Palestinian cause is to the Labour Party membership and parliamentary party. Passionate speeches in the plenary alongside hourly marches on the issue underpin most years’ conferences. So, with that in mind, as well as the continued violent imagery coming out of Gaza, it is entirely understandable that Starmer will continue to pivot his rhetoric away from US/UK shared foreign policy priorities in the Middle East, before likely snapping back come mid-October.

So, while some have pointed to this divergence in words on the Middle East as proof that the US and UK are drifting further apart under the second Trump administration, I actually disagree. Even with Starmer’s tonal pivots and last week’s call for Israeli restraint alongside Canadian PM Mark Carney and French President Emmanuel Macron, British military power, whether that be signals intelligence and air support from the UK’s two Cypriot military bases, or arms and munitions from UK-based defence companies, remains committed to supporting the Israeli government.

For that reason, as well as the political context, it is likely that the US will look through any strong wording coming out of Downing Street about the Israel-Palestine conflict, knowing this is more about Starmer shoring up his power base ahead of a key moment of vulnerability rather than about any actual policy pivots.

Turning to Ukraine, there was initial scepticism in Washington about Starmer’s intentions, especially given as within a four day period he offered to host President Trump for a State visit, before attempting to form a “coalition of the willing” in Europe to support Ukraine, amidst a faltering in relations between the US and Ukraine and that meeting between Presidents Trump and Zelenskyy. That divergence again received widespread coverage, which some pointed to as evidence that the special relationship was unravelling.

I, again, disagree with that view.

The United States will look warmly at the UK taking a more active and leading role in the European rearmament of Ukraine and of the wider continent, as it represents a widening of the burden sharing every US President, not just President Trump, has long called for. The recent agreement between the EU and the UK takes us one step closer to British companies being able to apply for EU SAFE funding, which the US will view as a positive signal that the UK still has an influential voice in at least certain arenas of European foreign and security policy, while also benefiting US firms seeking access to EU funding through established partnerships with UK firms.

Even the biggest bugbear for Trump watchers, his tariff and trade policy, will be unlikely to dent US and UK ties. President Trump’s trade policy mainly affects goods, which the UK has successfully managed to achieve carveouts for under the new bilateral agreement. Meanwhile, the UK’s main exports to the US are services, where the barriers to trade are often at the state rather than the federal level, and therefore outside the purview of the President. If anything, this will also help Prime Minister Starmer, who will continue to use Trump’s erratic tariff policy as an excuse to seek closer ties to the EU, a longstanding and strong demand amongst the Labour Party policy and political ecosystem.

So, in practice, I am optimistic that the UK and US relationship will continue to go from strength to strength, even as President Trump continues to upend established norms and turbulence in US foreign policy continues to ripple through the world.