For the self-styled monarch of the North, Andy Burnham, the outcome today of the state banquet is clear: any hoped-for bid for No 10 has just been kicked into touch by the actual King of England.
Such was the buoyant, deferent mood of Donald Trump on the back of his glittering Windsor stay, the press conference at Chequers yesterday passed with barely a whiff of controversy. Even the much-feared trip wire of Jeffrey Epstein and Peter Mandelson was deftly batted aside by the president, who, instead of rising to the bait, smoothly retorted with a confident smile: “I never knew him.” Meanwhile, Keir Starmer beside him frantically clawed at his notes, as if hoping to bury himself inside them.
Let’s be clear: King Charles III just saved the career of our severely embattled prime minister. Trump’s visit was a masterstroke of British diplomacy. Burnham, who has been chucking increasingly pointed verbal arrows at Starmer, is now firmly back on the sidelines.
There will have been multiple sighs of relief in No 10 that the royals won the day for the PM, as they did in Washington when Starmer was able to flourish a handwritten invitation from King Charles for Trump to attend an unprecedented second state visit. The pomp and ceremony of the last two days may have also shown Americans across the Atlantic, fed by increasingly eccentric Maga rhetoric, that we are not overrun by Muslims, held hostage to marauding illegal immigrants and that our streets are largely lawful.
Those in government have much to be grateful for – the House of Windsor showed far better foresight than most politicians. While many in the Labour Party felt free to take to X (Twitter) during Joe Biden’s reign to insult the former president, King Charles stayed in touch with Trump, wise to the fact that he might return to the White House and that his diplomatic skills would be much in need again.
Trump is now back in Washington, and only over the next weeks and months will the long-term benefits for Britain emerge from this extravaganza – movement on trade, tariffs, and hopefully more meaningful US action to end the war in Ukraine. But today there is no other interpretation: this visit was a meteoric success.
Even the most hardened republican cannot have missed the influence the theatrical glory of Wednesday night’s immaculately orchestrated ceremony had on our guest. Trump’s chief of staff Susie Wiles was unusually effusive to the gathered British press, admitting Trump had not just adored the banquet the night before, but his evening had been “a total blast”.
Trump himself couldn’t stop repeating how it was both the biggest honour and the highlight of his life. And we believe him. No detail had been overlooked: our best cutlery and royal jewels on sparkling display, our royals weighed down with so many ceremonial ribbons, medals and gold brocade, they could have been forgiven for requiring extra support. Even the presidential uber-sized cars and helicopters, deliberately projecting American power, ferrying Trump around, couldn’t overshadow the grandeur and beauty of the Windsor estate in full red-carpet flummery. He had also looked visibly moved earlier on in the day when visiting Elizabeth II’s resting place.
Trump is always awake to the power of performance and imagery, and in America, every television screen and newspaper is awash with pictures of him and the first lady travelling in the gilded Irish State Coach through Windsor alongside the King and Queen of England. It cannot be emphasised enough how much this would have meant to him. Trump has always been shunned by the older, grander American families of New York; viewed as loud, brash, a noisy real estate guy from Queens, invading their cushioned superiority.
And yet here he was, right in the bosom of British royalty, feted like no other American. One suspects even if he does win himself a Nobel Peace Prize (and, right now, that’s looking increasingly unlikely), this opulent event held in his honour, surrounded by America’s most powerful businessmen, from Apple’s Tim Cook to Blackstone’s Steve Schwarzman, all paying homage, will remain, in his eyes, a crowning achievement.
For Starmer, the visit may have gone the other way: always unpredictable, Trump could have flung endless grenades, but instead it was all back-slapping positivity, with the president avoiding the ideological rabbit holes he frequently disappears into – causing embarrassment for the government, focusing on division, not friendship.
The state visit won’t have done much for Starmer’s popularity at home, but it has allowed him vital breathing space. His only problem now is that the pageantry is over. There will be no third state visit to leverage. Let’s hope Trump’s rosy memories last long.
