Britain showered Trump with all the pomp it could muster. What did it get in return?

 In his state banquet speech, Donald Trump said the bond between the United States and Britain was “unbreakable.” In truth, the British government has feared all week that one misstep during the US president’s state visit could blow up the “special relationship” – and with it, Keir Starmer’s premiership.

Trump’s second state visit came at a dreadful time for Britain’s beleaguered prime minister. Days before Trump arrived, Starmer fired Peter Mandelson as Britain’s ambassador to Washington after the extent of his ties to the convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein became impossible to deny. He then had to make sure that Mandelson’s absence did not draw too much attention to Trump’s own past ties to Epstein. (The president says he cut off his friendship with the disgraced financier in the mid-2000s and did not speak to him for years before he died in jail in 2019.)

Nothing was to spoil Trump’s visit. When activists projected images of Trump and Epstein onto Windsor Castle, the night before his arrival, they were arrested. The president was kept at an arm’s length from the British public at all times, lest he see those protesting his visit and his politics. Even journalists appeared to play nice: at a news conference, Starmer was asked only one question about Epstein, which he swiftly skirted. See more