We begin today’s roundup with Ishaan Tharoor’s analysis of Donald Trump’s trip to London:
But the pomp and solemnity of the proceedings can’t hide the obvious strains posed by Trump’s arrival. His state visit to Britain — stalled for months amid acrimony and awkwardness — seems less a rekindling of the “special relationship” than a hostile incursion. On Tuesday, a mass protest rejecting Trump and his perceived anti-immigration, anti-environment, anti-feminist policies is expected to rock the heart of the British capital. [...]
Trump had barely reached the tarmac at London Stansted Airport when he lobbed angry tweets at Sadiq Khan, the city’s mayor. Trump branded Khan a “stone cold loser” after Khan wrote an op-ed citing Trump as “one of the most egregious examples of a growing global threat” of far-right nationalists in power.
“They are picking on minority groups and the marginalized to manufacture an enemy — and encouraging others to do the same,” Khan wrote about Trump and his ultranationalist counterparts in Europe. “And they are constructing lies to stoke up fear and to attack the fundamental pillars of a healthy democracy — equality under the law, the freedom of the press and an independent justice system.”
David Brennan at Newsweek:
Trump is not popular in the U.K. A Pew Research Center poll published in October found that just 28 percent of Britons surveyed had confidence in the president. This is far lower than former president Barack Obama, who had a 78 percent approval rating with Britons when he left office in 2016.
Trump did himself few favors over the weekend, breaching established diplomatic protocol several times and subsequently being accused of undue meddling in British politics.