Donald Trump’s UK visit: who will he meet and will he face protesters?
US president’s trip will be free of ‘pomp and ceremony’ - but mass protests are still expected
Donald Trump will make his first official visit to the UK this Friday, but looks likely to face a wave of protests rather than any red-carpet treatment.
Will it be a state visit?
No. Theresa May used up a considerable amount of political capital by extending a state visit invitation to Trump during her trip to Washington shortly after his inauguration.
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But the plans have been subject to repeated cancellations and delays as tensions flared between the two leaders.
There have also been threats of mass unrest in the UK, with more than 1.8 million people signing a petition at the start of last year calling for May to retract her invitation to Trump.
In June 2017, the prime minister criticised Trump’s response to the terrorist attack on London Bridge and his subsequent comments about London Mayor Sadiq Khan. The leaders clashed again in November, when May said the president had been “wrong” to retweet three anti-Muslim videos originally shared by far-right political group Britain First.
In January, Bloomberg reported that Trump had told May he would not visit the UK unless she could guarantee he would not face protests.
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Finally, in April the White House confirmed he would hold a “working visit” to the UK in July. However, the trip will be “minus pomp and ceremony”, and Trump will not be honoured with a state visit, which would have seen him attend an official banquet at Buckingham Palace and a carriage procession up the Mall, says The Guardian.
Will he meet the Queen?
The US president is still due to meet the Queen in Windsor on Friday. He will then travel to Chequers for talks with the prime minister before watching a military ceremony at Blenheim Palace, Winston Churchill’s birthplace.
At the moment he is not due to meet Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn, although in the past presidents have met the leader of the opposition.
Former UKIP leader Nigel Farage, who last week attacked plans to fly a 20ft “Baby Trump” blimp over the Houses of Parliament as “the biggest insult to a sitting US president ever”, has reportedly been banned from meeting his political ally by the government.
The London Evening Standard says the schedule is designed to highlight military ties between the UK and US but also to keep the president away from huge protests planned in London. Trump will not visit Downing Street and will only stay in the US ambassador’s residence near Regent’s Park for one night.
Where else will he visit?
After meeting the Queen and Theresa May on Friday, the president is expected to travel north to visit one of the two golf courses he owns in Scotland on Saturday or Sunday.
It is understood that all efforts are being made to woo the billionaire, with either a top-level professional player or member of the royal family scheduled to accompany him on his golf round.
The Financial Times reports that in an attempt by Westminster to “appease Scottish anger” at the visit, additional police costs will be picked up by the UK government.
Police Scotland estimates that Trump’s visit will cost around £5m and require more than 5,000 officers.
Yet despite best efforts to keep Trump isolated and away from expected protests, the trip promises to be a testing time for his protection detail.
So will there be protests?
The recent furore over Trump’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy, which has seen children separated from their parents at the Mexican border and held in cages, has only heightened public anger towards the president.
Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Britain last year following Trump’s inauguration to protest his attitude towards women, and a similar number could turn out for his visit next month.
The US president has previously been warned by London’s mayor that he should expect to see protests.
HuffPost UK says that “within an hour of the announcement, a Facebook event dedicated to a protest had gained 28,000 attendees”. It now stands at double that, with a further 158,000 people interested.
Ahead of a planned visit in February that was postponed, the Stop Trump campaign issued a rallying cry, urging people to join the demonstration in a bid to carry out a citizen’s arrest on the US president for incitement to racial hatred.
It was hoped to become the “biggest demonstration in British history”, organisers told the London Evening Standard.
If Trump thought his scaled-down visit would provoke less of a reaction from the British public, he appears to be mistaken.
Jo Swinson, the Liberal Democrat’s deputy leader and foreign affairs spokesperson, said the “scaled-down trip must not be met with scaled-down protests”.
She told HuffPost UK: “Protesting against a man with dangerous, misogynistic and racist views is our responsibility. It is our opportunity to stand in solidarity with all the people he has abused and denigrated.”
Is anyone looking forward to the visit?
Not everyone is planning to use the visit to protest.
A BMG survey for The Independent found that 42% of the public thought Trump should not have been invited, compared with 37% who thought it was the right decision. However, 44% thought the UK “must make every effort to accommodate” Trump to negotiate a post-Brexit trade deal, compared with 36% who disagreed.
Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, who famously said in December 2015 “the only reason I wouldn’t go to some parts of New York is the real risk of meeting Donald Trump”, described the president’s visit as “fantastic” news
The British ambassador to the US, Sir Kim Darroch, said he was “delighted” Trump would would be meeting May during his visit.
For his part, despite the threat of mass demonstrations, the president is likely to be unperturbed.
Speaking to LBC radio last week, US Ambassador to the UK Woody Johnson said: “He’s very thick-skinned. He knows what he wants to do and he speaks in a very clear and unusual way from most politicians.”