A Cabinet minister repeatedly dodged over whether Donald Trump has ‘Neo-Nazi sympathies’ today as Labour grapples with the Republican’s huge election win.
Pat McFadden sidestepped three times when asked in an interview to disown jibes previously levelled by colleague David Lammy.
The awkward exchange on LBC came as Keir Starmer desperately tries to smooth over relations with the president-elect.
The PM paid gushing tribute in a phone call last night, including ‘fondly’ reminiscing about an introductory dinner they had in New York in September.
But Sir Keir is facing a huge challenge as Tories demand he apologises for attacks on Mr Trump by senior Labour figures.
Foreign Secretary Mr Lammy previously branded Mr Trump a ‘Neo-Nazi sympathiser’ and a ‘tyrant in a toupee’, with Republican commentators warning that the president-elect will remember the slight.
Tensions also flared over Labour supporters helping to campaign for Democrat contender Ms Harris. The Republican’s campaign team to file a legal complaint with accusations of ‘foreign interference’.
Asked be presenter Nick Ferrari if he personally thought that Mr Trump harboured ‘Neo-Nazi sympathies’, Mr McFadden said: ‘I think the relationship between Britain and America is really important.’
The minister refused to give a direct answer twice more, insisting: ‘I don’t want to get into all the characteristics of people… what I think is important is this friendship between the two countries.’
During his tour of broadcast studios this morning, Mr McFadden argued that Mr Trump could see past previous swipes at him, including by his own vice-president elect JD Vance.
‘Look, a lot of people said things about Trump, not least his vice president, who mused whether Trump would be another Richard Nixon or America’s Hitler,’ he said.
‘If president-elect Trump held a grudge against everybody who’d said mean things about him in the past, he wouldn’t be talking to his vice president…
‘So these things have been said. But when it comes down to it, the alliance between the United Kingdom and the United States is very strong.
‘It’s very deep. It’s enduring. And we look forward to a good working relationship with the new president.’
He also dismissed Nigel Farage’s offer to act as a bridge to the president-elect.
Sir Keir has repeatedly clashed with billionaire Elon Musk, who looks likely to end up playing a key role in the Trump administration.
Sir Keir could now face a choice between allying more closely with the EU, or fostering tighter ties with the US – Britain’s biggest single trading partner.
Mr Trump is threatening huge tariffs on global imports to America, but had pledged to do a Transatlantic free trade deal with the UK when he was last in power.
One senior minister described Mr Trump’s return as a ‘nightmare’, adding: ‘We are going to have to deal with a whole new world order.
‘Whether you look at defence or trade or Ukraine or climate change, everything is going to change in ways that are unpredictable and difficult to navigate.’
Details of the chat with Mr Trump were revealed by Downing Street, with the readout notably more flowery than the bland records it normally issues.
Sir Keir also posted a photo on social media of himself laughing as they spoke.
No10 said Sir Keir congratulated Mr Trump on his ‘historic victory’ after US voters returned him to the White House.
‘The Prime Minister offered his hearty congratulations and said he looked forward to working closely with President-elect Trump across all areas of the special relationship,’ the readout said.
‘The leaders fondly recalled their meeting in September and President-elect Trump’s close connections and affinity to the United Kingdom, and looked forward to working with one another,’ No 10 added.
Former shadow chancellor John McDonnell has urged Sir Keir to move further to the Left, saying: ‘The key lesson of the Trump victory for us is that Labour has to deliver the significant improvement in quality of life that people can feel or we face the rise of right wing populism that has swept America. Half measures won’t be enough.’
But Nigel Farage, who has close links to Mr Trump, said the PM must ‘roll out the red carpet’.
KEIR STARMER
Last year, Sir Keir compared the Conservative Party with Mr Trump as he accused the Tories of falling far from Churchillian values.
‘Is there anybody in the Government now who feels a sense of obligation to anything other than their own self-interest? To democracy, the rule of law, serving our country?’ he asked in a speech in Buckinghamshire.
‘An entitlement to power totally unchecked by any sense of service or responsibility – that’s the cultural stain that runs through the modern Conservative Party.’
He added: ‘These aren’t Churchill’s Tories any more. If anything they behave more and more like Donald Trump. They look at the politics of America and they want to bring that here.
‘It’s all woke, woke, woke. Wedge, wedge, wedge. Divide, divide, divide.’
In June, the prime minister said following Mr Trump’s hush money trial conviction that it was an ‘unprecedented situation’.
‘We will work with whoever is elected president … that’s what you’d expect,’ Sir Keir said.
‘We have a special relationship with the US that transcends whoever the president is, but it is an unprecedented situation, there is no doubt about that.’
In the lead up to this year’s US presidential election, Sir Keir maintained that the Government will work with whoever is president.
FOREIGN SECRETARY DAVID LAMMY
In 2017, Mr Lammy called Mr Trump a ‘racist and KKK/neo-Nazi sympathiser’.
A year later, the Tottenham MP wrote in Time magazine that he would be protesting against the then-government’s ‘capitulation to this tyrant in a toupee’, in reference to Mr Trump’s first official visit to the UK.
‘Trump is not only a woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath,’ Mr Lammy wrote, ‘he is also a profound threat to the international order that has been the foundation of Western progress for so long.’
Asked about his past comments earlier this year, Mr Lammy said: ‘Where I can find common cause with Donald Trump, I will find common cause’.
He offered his congratulations to Mr Trump on Wednesday morning, saying: ‘We look forward to working with you and @JDVance in the years ahead.’
DEPUTY PM ANGELA RAYNER
Ms Rayner has publicly criticised Mr Trump more than once in posts on X, formerly Twitter.
On the day of the Capitol Hill riots in 2021, she tweeted: ‘The violence that Donald Trump has unleashed is terrifying, and the Republicans who stood by him have blood on their hands.’
Later in January that year, Ms Rayner said of the inauguration of Joe Biden as president: ‘I am so happy to see the back of Donald Trump, but even more so to see @KamalaHarris as VP.’
HEALTH SECRETARY WES STREETING
In 2017, Mr Streeting called Trump an ‘odious, sad little man’ in a post on X.
‘Imagine being proud to have that as your president,’ he added.
Asked on Tuesday about the social media post, the Health Secretary told Good Morning Britain: ‘The Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary have been working hard to build a relationship with President Trump and his team, so that in the event that he is elected as the next president of the United States, we start with the strong working relationship which is in our national interest and in the interests of the United States as well.’
ENERGY SECRETARY ED MILIBAND
Mr Miliband labelled Mr Trump a ‘groper’ and a ‘racist’ in November 2016.
‘The idea that we have shared values with a racist, misogynistic, self-confessed groper beggars belief,’ Mr Miliband told the BBC.
‘And I think we should be deeply worried about the implications for many of the things that we care about. Tackling climate change – he says it’s invented by the Chinese, climate change, it’s a hoax. His attitude to Russia.
‘And then this fantasy about trade. I mean, this guy is anti-trade. He’s an odd combination of protectionism, plus the old trickle-down formula that has got us into a lot of this mess in the first place.’