Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at British efforts to woo the Trump administration, a reboot of Canada-Mexico relations, and mass anti-austerity protests in France.
Dodging Hardballs
After a day of royal pomp and pageantry, U.S. President Donald Trump shifted to politics alongside an unlikely ally: British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who heads the Labour Party. The two leaders met at Chequers, the prime minister’s country residence, on Thursday to signal the importance of the two countries’ “special relationship” while dodging tough questions about some of their domestic and foreign policies.
Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at British efforts to woo the Trump administration, a reboot of Canada-Mexico relations, and mass anti-austerity protests in France.
Dodging Hardballs
After a day of royal pomp and pageantry, U.S. President Donald Trump shifted to politics alongside an unlikely ally: British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who heads the Labour Party. The two leaders met at Chequers, the prime minister’s country residence, on Thursday to signal the importance of the two countries’ “special relationship” while dodging tough questions about some of their domestic and foreign policies.
“We’re forever joined, and we are forever friends, and we will always be friends,” Trump said. He also complimented Starmer for being the first world leader in Trump’s second term to ink a new trade deal with the United States, announced in May.
For Starmer, the two-day state visit is part of Downing Street’s ongoing strategy to woo Trump as London seeks to strengthen its economy and ease U.S. tariffs. Inviting Trump for a day of royal treatment—complete with horse-drawn carriages, a military flyover, and an opulent state banquet at Windsor Castle—was only step one of the plan, though. Step two entails a $338 billion bilateral investment package.
Dubbed the Technology Prosperity Deal, major U.S. companies such as Blackstone, Microsoft, and OpenAI will invest more than $200 billion in Britain over the next decade. In exchange, several British corporations, including pharmaceuticals giant GSK, will invest in the United States. The deal also pledges greater bilateral cooperation in artificial intelligence, nuclear energy, and quantum computing.
“This partnership today is a signal of our determination to win this race together and to ensure it brings real benefits in jobs, in growth, in lower bills, to put more hard-earned cash in people’s pockets at the end of each month,” Starmer said on Thursday.
After winning election just over a year ago, Starmer’s public approval ratings are lagging as the country’s annual inflation rate in August was 3.8 percent—nearly double the central bank’s target. On Thursday, the Bank of England held interest rates steady, keeping consumer prices uncomfortably high.
Starmer isn’t the only one battling low popularity rankings. Recent YouGov polling shows that 70 percent of Britons dislike Trump and 44 percent believe that Starmer should have canceled his state visit. Thousands of British residents took to the streets on Wednesday to protest the U.S. president’s presence.
But growing backlash against both leaders did little to dampen Trump’s and Starmer’s spirits. The two glossed over their key differences—such as on Israel’s war in Gaza and the importance of wind power—to focus on where they find common ground. They both agreed that extra pressure must be placed on Russia to force President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table, though they remain at odds on how best to do that. And they pivoted away from questions about Starmer’s plan to recognize an independent Palestinian state, which Trump disagrees with.
Trump and Starmer also brushed aside questions on convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s ties to the U.S. president and Peter Mandelson, the former British ambassador to the United States. Trump was friends with Epstein in the 1990s, and Mandelson was fired last week for supporting Epstein after his convictions. (When asked about Mandelson, Trump said, “I don’t know him.” Trump met Mandelson several times, including in the Oval Office.)
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United front. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney traveled to Mexico City on Thursday to cement a united front against the United States’ trade war. “This is a very important relationship for Canada,” Carney said ahead of the two-day trip, adding that his talks with Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum will focus on security, health, and business ties—including by signing a comprehensive strategic partnership. This is a Canadian prime minister’s first trip to Mexico in eight years.
Despite Canada, Mexico, and the United States all being signatories to a continental free trade agreement, which is up for review next year, Ottawa and Mexico City have been forced to bear the brunt of many of Trump’s highest tariff rates; Trump has accused both countries of failing to crack down on fentanyl trafficking and undocumented immigration.
Rather than work together to offset the White House’s duties, though, senior Canadian politicians suggested last year that Ottawa was better off negotiating alone. Trump comparing Canada to Mexico was “the most insulting thing I’ve ever heard from our friends and closet allies, the United States of America,” Ontario Premier Doug Ford said at the time.
Under Carney, however, Canada is hoping to improve ties with Mexico by focusing on opening new bilateral markets to counteract U.S. tariffs.
Out with the old. Massive anti-austerity marches swept France on Thursday, as hundreds of thousands of people protested looming budget cuts under President Emmanuel Macron’s new government. Several major labor unions—including those representing teachers, health care workers, and train drivers—participated in strikes and rallies, while students gathered outside of their high schools in protest.
Demonstrators called for Macron and newly appointed Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu to scrap the previous government’s fiscal plans, which would slash around 44 billion euros (about $51 billion) from next year’s budget. Macron chose Lecornu to submit a new proposal that both appeases left-wing parties opposed to public funding cuts and addresses right-wing concerns about Paris’s high deficit, currently hovering at 5.8 percent of GDP.
By appointing Lecornu to be France’s fifth prime minister in less than two years, Macron was hoping to stave off calls for snap elections or his own removal. Yet many in France view the new premier as a continuation of old policies, such as Macron’s unpopular pension reforms. Around 80,000 police officers were deployed on Thursday to maintain order; at least 94 people were arrested by midday.
Mutual defense. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese was forced to stall efforts to sign a mutual defense treaty with Papua New Guinea on Wednesday and instead settle for a joint defense communique after the latter country’s cabinet failed to approve the proposed treaty. Papua New Guinea Prime Minister James Marape said the cabinet did not have enough members present at the time to reach the required quorum. According to Port Moresby, the text of the mutual defense treaty has been agreed to and is expected to be signed in the coming weeks.
The delay comes on the coattails of another diplomatic failure for Australia; last week, Albanese was unable to convince Vanuatu to sign a $326.5 million security partnership after a coalition partner in Vanuatu’s government called for further scrutiny of the deal. Canberra views both Papua New Guinea and Vanuatu as vital to countering Chinese influence in the Indo-Pacific.
Where Australia and its Pacific Island partners remain at odds, though, Saudi Arabia and nuclear-armed Pakistan were able to strike a mutual defense treaty late Wednesday. The agreement strengthens a decades-old security partnership and comes a week after Israel launched a strike on Hamas leaders in Qatar.
Odds and Ends
Half of the iconic ice cream duo Ben & Jerry’s is splitting from the beloved brand. Co-founder Jerry Greenfield announced on Tuesday that he is leaving the company after 47 years, alleging that the ice cream brand’s parent company, Unilever, had muzzled the brand’s longtime activism. “Standing up for the values of justice, equity, and our shared humanity has never been more important, and yet Ben & Jerry’s has been silenced, sidelined for fear of upsetting those in power,” Greenfield wrote in an open letter, explicitly calling out the Trump administration’s attacks on civil rights, women, LGBTQ individuals, and immigrants, among others.
A spokesperson for Magnum Ice Cream Co., Unilever’s ice cream unit that includes Ben & Jerry’s, said, “We disagree with his perspective and have sought to engage both co-founders in a constructive conversation on how to strengthen Ben & Jerry’s powerful values-based position in the world.”
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