Trump receives Charles III with praise and jokes, without forgetting darts against his enemies

LondonCharles III and Camilla brought the British weather to Washington this Tuesday. Intermittent rain in the early hours of a grey morning over the District of Columbia, as the King and Queen of England were formally received, with all honors, by Donald Trump and Melania in the gardens of the White House, as part of a four-day state visit to the United States. A visit to celebrate the two hundred and fifty years of independence that, in fact, had begun in the early hours of Monday afternoon. The Trumps today unveiled a solemn ceremony on the South Lawn of the presidential residence, a sign of the utmost distinction and diplomatic consideration towards a visiting head of state.

Trump, who does not want to miss an opportunity to be the protagonist, gave a speech of just over ten minutes. And he did not spare personal touches and jokes. For example, about his relationship with the first lady, comparing it to his parents' marriage: "[They] Were married for sixty-three years and, if you allow me, this is a record that we [he said, addressing his wife] will not be able to match, dear; I'm sorry, it just won't turn out that way. We'll do well, but not that well." And already launched, he also scattered some compliments towards the King, about whom he said his mother considered him very "cute," and also assured that he has a "wonderful accent." He described him, in any case, as "very elegant" and a man of great "intelligence, passion, and devotion."

Beyond jokes and pleasantries, and the memory of his mother, Mary Anne MacLeod, a Scot, the president has championed the historical ties between Washington and London. And he has presented the bilateral relationship between the two countries as a natural continuation of the same political and cultural lineage. The speech, laden with symbolism, has overlooked the criticisms that Trump has leveled in recent weeks at Her Majesty's government, specifically against the prime minister, Keir Starmer. As if he had never made them. In any case, he stated that Americans "have no closer friends than the British." With friends like these, Starmer needs no enemies.

The president's words were the preamble to the monarch's address to Congress, in the Capitol, which will take place at 9:00 PM this evening, Catalan time.

The president has argued, with a historicist tone, that American independence did not represent a break with British tradition, but the culmination of a political legacy born centuries earlier. According to Trump, before the Declaration of Independence in 1776, the colonists had already inherited "moral courage," "the English love of freedom," and a sense of "glory, destiny, and pride" that they share. The leader insisted that the "Anglo-Saxon courage" ran through the veins of the American patriots who drove independence.

In an effort to please his guests, and also the British, Trump also recalled Elizabeth II, whom he described as a "very special woman" and "greatly missed on both sides of the Atlantic." He did so next to the tree that the late queen planted during a previous visit to the White House (1991), a tree that the president's speechwriters turned into a metaphor for the bilateral relationship: "Planted by British hands, but grown on American soil."

But Trump wouldn't be Trump if he didn't also shoot some arrows at his enemies, even on the most protocolary occasions and even if subtly. When the president evoked Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt, who during the Second World War began to outline the future of the transatlantic relationship aboard the ship Prince of Wales, he maintained that that spirit continues to live in the "special relationship" between the United States and the United Kingdom. And as proof, he reiterated, the bust of the Old Lion is back in the Oval Office. Obama took it out in 2009, Trump put it back in 2017; Biden took it out again in 2021 and Trump put it back in 2025.

Bees, tea, and diplomacy

A storm in a teacup? The English expression a storm in a teacup fits, without much forcing, with the last few days that have been experienced in Washington: the presumed assassination attempt against the president Donald Trump, the arrival yesterday, Monday, of Charles III and Queen Camilla on their first state visit, to commemorate the two hundred and fifty years of the independence of the United States. Yesterday, almost immediately after getting off the plane, the two couples met over a cup of tea. And Trump, Melania, the King and the Queen discussed the situation. As if it had all been a storm in a teacup? Probably not: the consequences will continue to become evident when the royal trip ends.

But, then, what did they talk about in the early hours of the reunion? About the foiled attack or about Trump's repeated and recent disqualifications against the British Prime Minister, Keir Starmer? No. They talked, above all, about bees and also about the fact that they hadn't seen each other for seven months, when Trump and Melania visited Windsor and the crown gifted them with their pomp and circumstance.

After the kisses and smiles of welcome to the royal couple at the White House in the mid-afternoon (federal capital time), the guests went to have tea with the First Lady and the President in the so-called Green Room. The meeting over some aromatic royal blend or earl grey was scheduled to last twenty minutes according to the program, but it lasted 45. In diplomacy, even the clock is negotiated, and thus the idea of a relationship much more than cordial was conveyed. The choreography of the visit is, for the moment, impeccable.

When they savored the tea, the Trumps showed Charles and Camilla the beehives in the gardens of the presidential residence. The King's passion for ecology and natural life is well known, and according to chronicles published by the British press this Tuesday, Charles was delighted to discover some of the secrets of the White House. In fact, both the King and Queen, who often wears a bee-shaped brooch, each have their own beehives at Highgrove and Ray Mill, as well as at Buckingham Palace. To guests like Benjamin Netanyahu, Trump shows them the so-called Situation Room, from where not tea, but the most relevant decisions are made.

In any case, the planned schedules had already gone out the window to continue delving into the idea of extreme cordiality, and around the beehives on the South Lawn, next to the garden kitchen, and about the honey produced by the president's bees, the conversation continued fluidly. Until early afternoon, when Charles III and the Queen retired to the British embassy in Washington for a garden party with 650 guests, representatives of the numerous colony from the islands living in the United States.