US vice president JD Vance is to stay at David Lammy’s grace and favour country house when he visits the UK on holiday this summer, reports suggest.
Vance and his family will begin their summer holiday this Friday with a stay at Chevening, the Foreign Secretary’s Grade I-listed mansion in Kent, according to the Telegraph newspaper.
The pair are said to have developed a warm friendship, reportedly bonding over their difficult childhoods and shared Christian faith.
Lammy is reported to have attended mass at the vice president’s Washington residence during a visit in March, and now plans to repay the favour with the stay at his country home.
The two are expected to hold a bilateral meeting before being joined by their families at Chevening.
“Lammy has visited Vance’s family and the relationship looks like it will continue to grow on a personal as well as a professional basis,” a source told the Telegraph.
The vice president and his family are also expected to visit Hampton Court Palace during their trip to the UK, the mainstay of which will be spent in the Cotswolds.
Vance’s UK holiday comes just weeks after Donald Trump travelled to Scotland, on a private visit to his golf courses.
Trump also met with EU chief Ursula von der Leyen to agree a trade deal with the bloc, and with Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
Trump will return to the UK for a full state visit in September.
The Foreign Secretary’s burgeoning relationship with Vance represents a political change of heart, as Lammy was once an outspoken critic of Trump.
He described the US president as a “racist and KKK/neo-Nazi sympathiser” when Labour was in opposition, but since coming to power has brushed off his remarks as “old news”.
Asked about Vance’s visit to the UK, a Foreign Office spokesman said: “Ministerial engagements will be announced in the usual way.”
Previously, Vance claimed Scots who pray in their homes could be prosecuted after the recent introduction of buffer zones around Scottish abortion clinics.
