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UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer speaks on the phone to US President Donald Trump at a car factory in the West Midlands, United Kingdom, on May 8, 2025.

Alberto Pezzali/Pool via REUTERS

US-UK trade deal a victory for Starmer, with some caveats

When President Donald Trump announced a trade deal that will reduce US tariffs on UK cars and plane engines in return for greater access to the British market for American beef and chemicals, he singled out Prime Minister Keir Starmer for praise.

“The US and UK have been working for years to try and make a deal, and it never quite got there,” said Trump. “It did with this prime minister.”

The president’s comment twisted the knife into the UK Conservative Party, which tried — and failed — to achieve a trade deal with the Americans during its 14 years in power. It took Starmer, the Labour leader, to finally clinch the deal less than a year after entering office.

Starmer isn’t the only winner. Brexiteers cited the prospect of a US trade deal to further justify exiting the European Union. The deal caps a stellar week for Reform UK leader Nigel Farage, after his party made extraordinary strides in the local UK elections last Thursday.

There’s a caveat. The scope of the deal was somewhat limited, with many goods still subject to the 10% tariff — Trump said this rate was “pretty well set.” The UK tariff rate appears to have dropped, while the US one has risen, although the White House numbers can sometimes be off.

What’s Trump’s strategy? With this deal — the first the US has made since “Liberation Day” — it’s not clear whether the president’s main goal is protectionism or winning concessions from America’s allies.

The US did nab some wins from the pact, including access to UK meat markets, but they inked it with a country with which they already have a trade surplus. Trump thus achieved both of these goals, making it unclear where his priority lies.

UK Secretary of State for Business and Trade Jonathan Reynolds meets Indian Minister of Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal for trade talks, in London, United Kingdom, on April 28, 2025.

Department for Business and Trade/Handout via REUTERS

UK, India finally cinch trade deal

The United Kingdom on Tuesday sealed its largest trade deal since leaving the European Union, inking a pact with India in a big political win for Prime Minister Keir Starmer.

The highlights: drink and drive. India’s tariffs on UK whisky and gin will halve from 150% to 75%, before falling to 40% over the next decade. Levies on UK auto products will also plummet from 100% to 10%, albeit with some quotas in place. The UK, in turn, will slash tariffs on Indian clothing, foodstuffs, and jewels.

UK-India trade surpassed $50 billion last year, and the deal is projected to add $35 billion a year by 2040.

Starmer succeeds where Sunak failed. Former PM Rishi Sunak had tried desperately to clinch a deal with India during his 20-month premiership.

The migration angle. The pact exempts Indians on short-term UK visas from paying social security taxes for three years – the UK right is already mad about that.

Mujtaba Rahman, Eurasia Group’s managing director of Europe, said the deal is “welcome news” for the UK government.

“However, the real test for Keir Starmer will be how far he can dismantle the trade friction with the UK’s biggest trading partner – the EU,” Rahman added. “That will require a bolder approach than we have seen so far.”

Street vendors stand on a pirogue with goods to be sold at Kituku market, on the bank of Lake Kivu, in Goma, which is controlled by M23 rebels, in North Kivu province of the Democratic Republic of Congo March 21, 2025.

REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra

Small Country, Big Story: How Rwanda’s trying to woo Washington

As Western nations adopt increasingly hardline stances on migration, Rwanda has positioned itself to capitalize on these concerns by offering to accept deportees in exchange for payment.

In 2022, then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson struck a $385 million deal with Rwanda to house and process thousands of asylum-seekers. The controversial plan ultimately cost British taxpayers an estimated $949 million before it was scrapped in 2024 by Prime Minister Keir Starmer, following two years of legal challenges and widespread criticism over Rwanda’s status as an unsafe destination for migrants. The UK received no refund.

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UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer meets with US President Donald Trump alongside US Vice President JD Vance and UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy in the Oval Office at the White House on February 27, 2025, in Washington, D.C., USA.

Carl Court/Pool via REUTERS

Vance ignites hope of much-coveted US-UK trade deal

The US trade deal that London has been chasing for years is closer to reality now, after US Vice President JD Vance told UnHerd on Monday that there is a “good chance” that an agreement is possible.

UK Business and Trade Minister Sarah Jones alsosaid the negotiations are in a “good position,” but refused to divulge any timeline.

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Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy, France's President Emmanuel Macron and Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer speak during a trilateral meeting on the sidelines of a summit for "Coalition of the Willing" at Elysee Palace in Paris, France March 27, 2025.

Ludovic Marin/Pool via REUTERS

The UK, the EU and a potential landmark post-Brexit defense pact

With Russia’s Vladimir Putin pressing forward on one side and America’s Donald Trump potentially stepping back on the other, curious new things are happening in the European defense sector.

The EU and the United Kingdom are now working toward adefense and security pact to be unveiled at a summit of European leaders hosted by UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer on May 19.

This will be the first such summit of EU and British leaders since “Brexit”. It comes at a time when the UK and France are leading an effort to form a “coalition of the willing” to safeguard any potential Russia-Ukraine ceasefire.

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- YouTube

Is the US-Europe alliance permanently damaged?

Carl Bildt, former prime minister of Sweden and co-chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations, shares his perspective on European politics from Stockholm, Sweden.

Is the transatlantic relationship permanently damaged by what we have seen during the last 10 days or so?

Well, there is no question that the last 10 days or so have been the worst by far for the transatlantic relationship in, well, modern recorded history. You can go through all of the details if you want. It started with the shameful vote in the UN General Assembly on the same day that was three years after the war of aggression that Russia started, where the United States turned around, lined up with Russia, and with primarily a bunch of countries that you would not normally like to be seen in the company of, in order to try to defeat the Europeans, and defeat the Ukrainians, and defeat the Japanese, and defeat the Australians, defeat all of the friends who have criticized the Russians.

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- YouTube

Can Europe broker a Ukraine ceasefire?

Ian Bremmer's Quick Take: A Quick Take to kick off your week. The big news, everything around Russia, Ukraine, the United States, and Europe. The Europeans now with the ball in their court, a big summit, a coalition of the willing in London this week. And Zelensky very warmly embraced, quite literally, by UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and by everyone in attendance. It was very different visuals, very different takeaways than the meeting between Zelensky, Trump, and Vance in the Oval Office, which couldn't have gone much worse if everyone tried.

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Britain's Prime Minister Keir Starmer delivers a speech during a visit to the Manufacturing Futures Lab at UCL in London, on Jan. 13, 2025, as he prepares to launch a plan to harness AI to spur growth and efficiency in the country.

HENRY NICHOLLS/Pool via REUTERS

British PM wants sovereign AI

On Monday, the British government announced the AI Opportunities Action Plan, Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s economic and technological development plan for artificial intelligence. Starmer’s goals include building a homegrown challenger to OpenAI, building data centers nationwide, and exploring renewable energy sources — including nuclear energy — to power the data centers.

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