During his visit to the UK, Donald Trump was treated to two days of royal pomp and pageantry, including a glittering state dinner and a private meeting with the King, during which both hailed the ‘special relationship’ between their two countries. Afterwards, the President said, ‘We were together for a long time. Really two days. I just left him. He is a great person. I knew him as Prince Charles originally and now as King Charles. And the people love him in this country.’
Trump has long been vocal of his respect for the British monarchy, and once told Fox News that he and the late Queen Elizabeth II had ‘too much fun’ during his last state visit to Britain in 2019. ‘I have such a great relationship, and we were laughing and having fun,’ he said of the trip, which saw protests on the streets of London and drew accusations of Trump breaking royal protocol when he walked in front of Her late Majesty. ‘[H]er people said she hasn’t had so much fun in 25 years. Then I got criticised for it because they said we were having too much fun,’ the President added.
Trump even went as far as to claim the late monarch considered him her ‘favourite president’ – a view somewhat contested by Craig Brown’s biography, A Voyage Around the Queen, which suggests she actually found Trump ‘very rude’. Whatever Queen Elizabeth’s misgivings about Trump, however, these are not necessarily shared by her son. The King has a relationship with the President that dates back to the 1980s, when he had tea at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence during a trip to Palm Beach. The two are said to regularly exchange letters (with Charles even writing to express his condolences after the Trump was shot during a rally in Pennsylvania rally last July). The two have been described as ‘pretty close’, especially since Charles undertook hosting duties during Trump’s 2019 visit, as one source told The Telegraph. ‘A lot of people may not necessarily realise that.’
It is little surprise, therefore, that before the President and First Lady flew back to Washington on board Air Force One, Trump was full of praise for the state visit and the ‘special bond’ between the UK and the US. ‘We’re grateful beyond words for the spectacular honour of the state visit yesterday at Windsor Castle, hosted by His Majesty King Charles III and Her Majesty, Queen Camilla,’ he said. ‘These are two fantastic people. We will never forget it.’