The king charms Trump, but Starmer's US ordeal will continue

In one legislative chamber, a British king appealed to centuries of shared history in a bid to preserve his country's most important alliance. In another, an ocean away, a British prime minister watched his agenda get sidelined again by his past efforts to protect the U.S.-U.K. "special relationship."

The twin scenes, playing out in Washington's House of Representatives and the House of Commons in London, illustrated how much managing ties with Donald Trump's America has come to consume the British state. Despite Prime Minister Keir Starmer's efforts to adapt his left-leaning Labour government to the billionaire Republican's personality-driven foreign policy, he has watched ties sink to their lowest level in decades.

This week, Starmer deployed the best messenger he could muster to reach a president who is unusually comfortable associating himself with royalty: King Charles III. The 77-year-old monarch's state visit to Washington - ostensibly to mark the 250th anniversary of American independence from Britain - gave Trump the opportunity to hold a military review and a fighter-jet flyover at the White House.

"TWO KINGS" the White House posted on its official social media account, alongside a photo of Charles and Trump standing side by side. Still, the visit elicited some reassuring words from Trump who praised the "cherished bond" between the two countries and said he was "very certain that it will continue that way long into the future."

Back in London, however, Starmer was battling to contain the fallout from his first attempt to navigate a more transactional approach in Washington: the disastrous appointment of - now former - Ambassador to the U.S. Peter Mandelson. Even as Charles was exchanging gifts with Trump at the White House, members of Parliament in Westminster were debating whether to refer Starmer to an ethics investigation for assuring them "due process" had been followed in the nomination.

Starmer won the vote, but the months-long uproar over Mandelson's ties to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein have helped push his premiership to the brink. Tuesday's debate occupied several of parliament's last hours in session before recess with key pieces of government-backed legislation waiting to be approved.

The drip feed of revelations about how various officials overlooked Mandelson's past associations in the rush to install someone they thought could better communicate with the Trump administration has done much to erode the prime minister's authority and fuel speculation about a challenge to replace him.

That struggle was laid out in testimony in parliament on Tuesday by the architect of Starmer's rise to power, Morgan McSweeney. The prime minister's former chief of staff, who resigned amid a previous surge in outrage over the Mandelson appointment, explained to MPs the on the Foreign Affairs Committee how Trump's 2024 victory over then-Vice President Kamala Harris had sent the government reeling.

"There would have been, for a Labour administration, a broader range of candidates available to him had the Democrats won that election," McSweeney said. "If Kamala Harris had won the U.S. presidential election, I think it would have gone to a different candidate."

Mandelson featured prominently in Starmer's early overtures to Trump, including his gesture to invite the president to an unusual second state visit in Britain last year. The U.K. was the first country to sign a trade pact with Trump in the wake of his "Liberation Day" tariff barrage, and, for a few months, spared Starmer from the same messy public fight Canada's Mark Carney, another of Charles' prime ministers, endured.

But those gains have proved fleeting, as Starmer balked at Trump's claims to Greenland and pressure on the U.K. to commit resources to his military campaign against Iran. Key issues in the trade deal remain unresolved and Trump has withdrawn support for Starmer's plan to transfer ownership of a strategic island chain in the Indian Ocean, plunging the proposal into limbo.

Starmer's government, which continues to debate how to meet Trump's spending demands for North Atlantic Treaty Organization nations, has found itself on the receiving end of the president's latest threats against the alliance. Reuters reported just days before the king's visit that a Pentagon official had suggested reviewing Britain's claim to the Falkland Islands as part of a range options to punish the country over its lack of support for the war in Iran.

"The future of the transatlantic alliance hangs in the balance," Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, a New York Democrat, said on Tuesday, adding that he hoped Charles could get Trump to understand the stakes. "Our national security and the security of the world depends on it."

The cracks in the U.S.-U.K. relationship showed through the carefully choreographic pageantry. Just before King Charles arrived at the White House, the Financial Times reported that Mandelson's replacement as ambassador had played down the special relationship in a private meeting with students, saying the U.S.'s only such relationship was "probably Israel."

A member of Starmer's Cabinet was quick to shrug off the remarks. "I don't think people have to apologize for every single comment that they make," Steve Reed, the housing minister, told Times Radio.

It was left to the king, who is bound by constitutional convention to stay above day-to-day politics, to take the unusual step of assuming an overtly diplomatic role in trying to stabilize the relationship. In a speech to Congress, Charles drew on everything from the Magna Carta to the principles of the American Revolution to the blood shed in two world wars to explain why the allies should stay together.

"The story of the United Kingdom and the United States is, at its heart, a story of reconciliation, renewal and remarkable partnership," Charles said in a speech interrupted by frequent standing ovations from American lawmakers. "From the bitter divisions of 250 years ago, we forged a friendship that has grown into one of the most consequential alliances in human history."

Trump himself praised the remarks hours later at the White House. "A great speech. I was very jealous." The review from Senator Lindsey Graham, a close ally of the president, was that "the King nailed it."

"There is often a political split screen in the U.S.-U.K. relationship, with one leader or another experiencing political turbulence at home," said Max Bergmann, a former State Department official who now directs the Europe, Russia and Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic & International Studies. "But the relationship almost always rises above that. It points to the strength of the partnership. Leaders come and go but the ‘special relationship' lives on."

But back in Britain, many will wonder how long before the cracks in the relationship emerge again. Anand Menon, professor of European politics and foreign affairs at King's College London, said any impact Charles may have on Trump is unlikely to last.

"My hunch is that the sort of warm, fuzzy feelings of this weekend wouldn't endure that long," said Menon, who's also a nonresident senior fellow in the Center on the United States and Europe at Brookings. "President Trump doesn't seem to have that much of a long memory."

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-With assistance from Ellen Milligan, Erik Wasson, Joe Mayes, Courtney Subramanian and Jennifer A. Dlouhy.

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This story was originally published April 29, 2026 at 9:30 AM.