Trump congratulates pal Nigel Farage for his ‘big win’ after Reform leader landed a seat in Parliament… but fails to mention Keir Starmer after Labour election landslide
Donald Trump led the way in congratulating his friend Nigel Farage on his first appointment as a member of the British Parliament.
“Congrats to Nigel Farage on his big WIN of a seat in parliament amid the success of UK election reform. Nigel is a man who truly loves his country! DJT,” the Republican presidential candidate wrote in a post on TruthSocial.
However, Trump made no reference to new Prime Minister Keir Starmer in his social media activities. Starmer has previously said his government will work with whoever is in the White House after the November election.
Farage, 60, originally said he had no plans to run in the July election, opting to focus on campaigning for Trump in the United States. A sudden U-turn saw him abandon those plans and launch his campaign a month before ballots were cast.
Partial results show that the anti-immigration Reform Party, the successor to the Brexit Party, won votes from both the Conservatives and Labour.
Donald Trump led the congratulations to his friend Nigel Farage on his first appointment as a member of the British Parliament
Farage easily won the election in the coastal town of Clacton, where he received almost 25,000 votes
In his praise on social media, Trump made no reference to new Prime Minister Keir Starmer
Farage said the party would “come second in hundreds of constituencies.” It is not yet clear how many seats Reform will win.
He said there was a “huge divide” in British politics and it was his job to close that divide.
āMy plan is to build a national mass movement in the coming years,ā he said.
Farage was a member of the European Parliament from 1999 until Brexit and has attempted to enter Westminster several times.
Farage, leader of the Reform Party, won almost 25,000 votes in Clacton, an area that was strongly pro-Brexit in 2016.
Trump and Farage’s relationship dates back to 2016, when the former The Apprentice host gave a series of speeches for him during his first presidential campaign.
Farage was among those in attendance at Trump’s inauguration in January 2017.
The couple’s relationship was partly fostered by Republican activist John Bartley Boykin, who met Farage at the 2016 Republican National Convention. Boykin died last March at the age of 32.
If Trump wins the race against President Joe Biden in November, he will have to build a relationship with Starmer’s new government.
Recently, Starmer’s future foreign secretary, David Lammy, said that Trump is “often misunderstood”.
During Biden’s inauguration in January 2021, Lammy said the ceremony “filled him with joy.”
That same month, Lammy again condemned Trump.
āDonald Trump’s entire presidency has been a reign of recklessness, narcissism and delusion,ā he wrote on Twitter.