With Brexit Done, Trump Sets Himself Up to Be Disruptor Again
- Push for U.S.-U.K. trade deal about countering EU trade moves
- Johnson’s Huawei choice, however, shows limits of Trump power
Donald Trump with Boris Johnson in Dec. 2019.
Photographer: Peter Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images
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Donald Trump has spent the past four years lobbing unsolicited advice at British prime ministers on the best path forward for an exit from the European Union and holding out promises of a grand new trans-Atlantic trade alliance. Now that Brexit is official, though, Trump gets to really double down on a role he relishes: that of the geopolitical disruptor.
Just as Prime Minister Boris Johnson wants to use talks with the U.S. as a way to increase his leverage in trade discussions with the EU, Trump has made clear he sees a deal with the U.K. as an irresistible opportunity to poke a finger in the eye of an EU he has labeled “worse than China.”