Trump and Starmer to meet in Scotland with trade deal on the agenda
Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. I’m Tom Ambrose and will be bringing you all the latest news lines over the next few hours.
We start with the news that president Donald Trump will host the British prime minister Keir Starmer at his golf resort in western Scotland on Monday for talks ranging from their recent bilateral trade deal to the worsening hunger crisis in Gaza, the two governments said.
Trump, riding high after announcing a huge trade agreement with the European Union late on Sunday, said he expected Starmer would also be pleased, Reuters reported.
“The prime minister of the UK, while he’s not involved in this, will be very happy because you know, there’s a certain unity that’s been brought there, too,” Trump said. “He’s going to be very happy to see what we did.”
Starmer had hoped to negotiate a drop in U.S. steel and aluminium tariffs as part of the talks, but Trump on Sunday ruled out any changes in the 50% steel and aluminium duties for the EU, and has said the trade deal with Britain is “concluded”
British business and trade minister Jonathan Reynolds told the BBC the talks with Trump offered Britain a good chance to advance its arguments, but he did not expect announcements on the issue on Monday.
Trump and Starmer were expected to meet at 12pm BST (7am ET) at Trump’s luxury golf resort in Turnberry, on Scotland’s west coast, before travelling on together later to a second sprawling estate owned by Trump in the east, near Aberdeen, where he is due to arrive at 5.25pm.
Hundreds of police officers were guarding the perimeter of the Turnberry course and the beach that flanks it, with a helicopter hovering overhead, although there was no sign of protesters outside the course.
Starmer was arriving from Switzerland, where England on Sunday won the women’s European football championship final.
In other developments:
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Donald Trump has announced a tariff deal with the European Union to end months of difficult negotiations between Washington and Brussels after meeting the European Commission chief, Ursula von der Leyen, at his Turnberry golf resort in Scotland. “This is really the biggest trading partnership in the world so we should give it a shot,” the president said before the private meeting started.
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US House speaker Mike Johnson said he would have “great pause” about granting a pardon or commutation to Ghislaine Maxwell while Kentucky Republican representative Thomas Massie said a pardon should be on the table for the jailed Epstein confidante if she were to give helpful information around the Epstein case.
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A top US medical body has expressed “deep concern” to Robert F Kennedy Jr over news reports that the health secretary plans to overhaul a panel that determines which preventive health measures, including cancer screenings, should be covered by insurance companies. The letter from the the American Medical Association comes after the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that Kennedy plans to overhaul the 40-year old US preventive services task force because he regards it as too “woke”, according to sources.
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Thai and Cambodian leaders will meet on Monday for talks to end hostilities, Thailand said, after pressure from Donald Trump to end a deadly border dispute.
Key events
Further to my previous post, Donald Trump the number one priority in Gaza was getting people fed, because “you have a lot of starving people”, adding that he was not going to take a position on Palestinian statehood at the moment.
Speaking alongside British prime minister Keir Starmer at his golf resort in Turnberry, Scotland, said the United States had provided $60m for humanitarian aid, and other nations would have to step up.
He said he discussed the issue with European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen yesterday, and she told him European countries would step up their assistance very substantially. He said he also planned to discuss the humanitarian situation with Starmer during today’s visit.
Trump said he would not comment on a push by French president Emmanuel Macron to back Palestinian statehood.
Trump also criticized the Hamas militant group for not agreeing to release more hostages, living and dead, and said he had told Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu that Israel’s approach would likely have to change.
“I told Bibi that you have to maybe do it a different way,” Trump said, echoing similar comments made on Sunday.
Asked if a ceasefire was still possible, Trump said: “Yeah, a ceasefire is possible, but you have to get it, you have to end it.” He did not elaborate on what he meant.
Donald Trump also said he was reducing the 50-day deadline he gave Russia over its war in Ukraine, saying he was disappointed in Vladimir Putin.
“I’m disappointed in President Putin,” he said. “I’m going to reduce that 50 days that I gave him to a lesser number.” He did not give a new deadline.
Donald Trump has said that the European Union is going to send more aid to help Gaza and that he plans to ask British prime minister Keir Starmer to help.
Trump, speaking alongside Starmer in Scotland, also said he had told Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu that his fight in Gaza against Hamas would have to be different after talks on a ceasefire and hostage release fell apart last week.
The United States is still working on aspects of its EU trade deal, including steel and digital services taxes, even as it meets with China this week to push talks forward and continues negotiations with India, the US trade representative said on Monday.
“There are certainly areas to keep working on in different sectors,” Jamieson Greer told CNBC in an interview, referring to the US-EU framework announced over the weekend.
On China, he said: “I don’t expect some kind of enormous breakthrough today. What I expect is continued monitoring and checking in on the implementation of our agreement thus far.”
Egypt’s president Abdel Fattah al-Sisi called on US president Donald Trump in a televised speech on Monday to exert all efforts to end the war in Gaza and to allow entry of aid to the enclave.
“He is capable of stopping the war”, Sisi said.
The Scottish first minister has said he will seek to ensure president Donald Trump knows the “strength of feeling” in Scotland over the humanitarian situation in Gaza when they meet.
John Swinney said president Trump is “best placed” to put pressure on the Israeli government. They are due to have a meeting tomorrow when president Trump opens his new golf course in Aberdeenshire, and the first minister’s team has not denied reports they will have dinner on Monday.
Speaking to the PA news agency, the First Minister said: “I want to use the opportunity of president Trump’s visit in Scotland to pursue some of the domestic and international concerns of the people of Scotland.”
Relief for US tariffs on Scotch whisky would be one of the key issues, he said.
Swinney said people had been “horrified” by events in Gaza, adding: “We need to take action to secure a ceasefire in the Middle East.
“We need to take action to deliver humanitarian aid on the ground for the people of Gaza and the individual who is perhaps best placed to apply that pressure to the Israeli government is president Trump.
“And I want to ensure that president Trump appreciates the strength of feeling in Scotland that that should be the case.”
Sam Levin
US immigration officers made false and misleading statements in their reports about several Los Angeles protesters they arrested during the massive demonstrations that rocked the city in June, according to federal law enforcement files obtained by the Guardian.
The officers’ testimony was cited in at least five cases filed by the US Department of Justice (DoJ) amid the unrest. The DoJ has charged at least 26 people with “assaulting” and “impeding” federal officers and other crimes during the protests over immigration raids. Prosecutors, however, have since been forced to dismiss at least eight of those felonies, many of them which relied on officers’ inaccurate reports, court records show.
The DoJ has also dismissed at least three felony assault cases it brought against Angelenos accused of interfering with arrests during recent immigration raids, the documents show.
The rapid felony dismissals are a major embarrassment for the Trump-appointed US attorney for southern California, Bill Essayli, and appeared to be the result of an unusual series of missteps by the DoJ, former federal prosecutors said.
US senators from both major parties plan to introduce bills this week targeting China over its treatment of minority groups, dissidents and Taiwan, emphasizing security and human rights as president Donald Trump focuses on trade with Beijing.
The three bills, seen by Reuters ahead of their introduction, have Democratic and Republican sponsors, a departure from the fierce partisanship dividing Washington.
Trump’s push to reach economic agreements between the world’s two biggest economies has strong support in Congress, especially from his fellow Republicans, but has prompted some China hawks to worry that the US government is de-emphasizing security issues.
“It does appear that President Trump is keen to negotiate some kind of deal with China, and gaps are opening between his approach to China and the approaches of some members of his team, as well as with Congress, which overall has been quite hawkish on China,” said Bonnie Glaser, an Asia expert at the German Marshall Fund of the United States.
The desire for a hard line on China is one of the few truly bipartisan sentiments in the perennially divided Congress, even as many lawmakers support Trump’s efforts to rebalance the bilateral trade relationship.
“The United States cannot afford to be weak in the face of the People’s Republic of China and its aggression around the world,” said Democrat Jeff Merkley of Oregon, a lead sponsor of all three bills.
Australia won’t receive Aukus nuclear submarines unless US doubles shipbuilding, admiral warns
Ben Doherty
The US cannot sell any Virginia-class nuclear submarines to Australia without doubling its production rate, because it is making too few for its own defence, the navy’s nominee for chief of operations has told Congress.
There are “no magic beans” to boosting the US’s sclerotic shipbuilding capacity, Admiral Daryl Caudle said in frank evidence before a Senate committee.
The US’s submarine fleet numbers are a quarter below their target, US government figures show, and the country is producing boats at just over half the rate it needs to service its own defence requirements.
Testifying before the Senate Committee on Armed Services as part of his confirmation process to serve as the next chief of naval operations, Caudle lauded Royal Australian Navy sailors as “incredible submariners”, but said the US would not be able to sell them any boats – as committed under the Aukus pact – without a “100% improvement” on shipbuilding rates.
The US Navy estimates it needs to be building Virginia-class submarines at a rate of 2.00 a year to meet its own defence requirements, and about 2.33 to have enough boats to sell any to Australia. It is currently building Virginia-class submarines at a rate of about 1.13 a year, senior admirals say.
The national congress of Palau has said it “cannot accept” a United States proposal for the Pacific Islands nation to accept asylum seekers from third countries, as its president holds annual funding talks in Washington.
Palau’s national congress wrote to president Surangel Whipps Jr earlier this month urging him to reject the request by the Trump administration.
A letter signed by Senate president Hokkon Boules and House of Delegates speaker Gibson Kanai, viewed by Reuters, said the congress strongly supports Palau’s partnership with the United States, but “cannot accept this specific proposal”.
Palau, with a population of 17,000, has a compact of free association with the United States providing economic assistance in return for allowing the US military access to its territory.
“We advise against proceeding further on this matter only because of the practical issues that the introduction of refugees would raise in our society,” said the letter, dated 21 July.
Top US and Chinese economic officials will begin the latest round of trade negotiations in Stockholm on Monday afternoon local time at the Rosenbad government office, a source familiar with the planning of the talks said.
Discussions are continuing regarding any tariff exemptions for the wines and spirits sectors in the framework trade deal between the European Union and United States, a senior European Commission official said on Monday.
The official added that talks in this regard were more advanced in the spirits sector, as opposed to the wines sector.
Trump and Starmer to meet in Scotland with trade deal on the agenda
Hello and welcome to the US politics live blog. I’m Tom Ambrose and will be bringing you all the latest news lines over the next few hours.
We start with the news that president Donald Trump will host the British prime minister Keir Starmer at his golf resort in western Scotland on Monday for talks ranging from their recent bilateral trade deal to the worsening hunger crisis in Gaza, the two governments said.
Trump, riding high after announcing a huge trade agreement with the European Union late on Sunday, said he expected Starmer would also be pleased, Reuters reported.
“The prime minister of the UK, while he’s not involved in this, will be very happy because you know, there’s a certain unity that’s been brought there, too,” Trump said. “He’s going to be very happy to see what we did.”
Starmer had hoped to negotiate a drop in U.S. steel and aluminium tariffs as part of the talks, but Trump on Sunday ruled out any changes in the 50% steel and aluminium duties for the EU, and has said the trade deal with Britain is “concluded”
British business and trade minister Jonathan Reynolds told the BBC the talks with Trump offered Britain a good chance to advance its arguments, but he did not expect announcements on the issue on Monday.
Trump and Starmer were expected to meet at 12pm BST (7am ET) at Trump’s luxury golf resort in Turnberry, on Scotland’s west coast, before travelling on together later to a second sprawling estate owned by Trump in the east, near Aberdeen, where he is due to arrive at 5.25pm.
Hundreds of police officers were guarding the perimeter of the Turnberry course and the beach that flanks it, with a helicopter hovering overhead, although there was no sign of protesters outside the course.
Starmer was arriving from Switzerland, where England on Sunday won the women’s European football championship final.
In other developments:
-
Donald Trump has announced a tariff deal with the European Union to end months of difficult negotiations between Washington and Brussels after meeting the European Commission chief, Ursula von der Leyen, at his Turnberry golf resort in Scotland. “This is really the biggest trading partnership in the world so we should give it a shot,” the president said before the private meeting started.
-
US House speaker Mike Johnson said he would have “great pause” about granting a pardon or commutation to Ghislaine Maxwell while Kentucky Republican representative Thomas Massie said a pardon should be on the table for the jailed Epstein confidante if she were to give helpful information around the Epstein case.
-
A top US medical body has expressed “deep concern” to Robert F Kennedy Jr over news reports that the health secretary plans to overhaul a panel that determines which preventive health measures, including cancer screenings, should be covered by insurance companies. The letter from the the American Medical Association comes after the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday that Kennedy plans to overhaul the 40-year old US preventive services task force because he regards it as too “woke”, according to sources.
-
Thai and Cambodian leaders will meet on Monday for talks to end hostilities, Thailand said, after pressure from Donald Trump to end a deadly border dispute.
