British Prime Minister Andy Burnham and US President Donald Trump held their first face-to-face meeting on Tuesday on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York, with both leaders striking a warm tone and Trump declaring that Burnham "gets it" and would be a "great prime minister." The encounter, closely watched as a bellwether for the state of the so-called special relationship, appeared to go smoothly despite a packed and sensitive agenda.
Trump opened the joint press appearance by praising Burnham as someone with "a lot of assets on his side" and said the United States was with the UK "all the way," while also describing him as a "natural businessperson" — a characterisation likely to draw wry comment from some of Burnham's domestic critics given his background on the left of British politics. When asked whether Burnham was someone he could do business with, Trump was positive: "He gets it, he understands what he has to do." The two leaders had spoken twice by phone since Burnham took office in late July, and Downing Street had described those calls as establishing a "productive relationship." Trump, who had previously dismissed Burnham as merely "a nice guy," notably contrasted the current warmth with his rocky dealings with predecessor Keir Starmer, saying relations were "more up now" under the new prime minister. Burnham noted their prior exchanges and gently corrected Trump's description of Manchester — the northern English city where Burnham served as mayor before entering Downing Street — as a "town," calling it "a great city" to laughter.
The substance of the meeting covered a broad range of issues, including Ukraine, the Middle East, trade, energy, immigration and the Falkland Islands — the South Atlantic archipelago claimed by Argentina but administered by the United Kingdom, where a 1982 war was fought and a 2013 referendum saw 99.8% of residents vote to remain a British overseas territory. Burnham confirmed he raised the Falklands directly with Trump, saying "you were good enough to listen to us on those issues," though Trump made no public statement on sovereignty. The issue had become sensitive eleven days earlier when Trump, speaking in Dublin, had sidestepped a question about whether the US would come to Britain's aid in any future conflict over the islands. On Ukraine, Burnham was seeking interceptor missiles to strengthen Kyiv's air defences ahead of winter. The Middle East discussion touched on efforts to reopen the Strait of Hormuz — a critical shipping lane largely blocked since a war with Iran began in February, driving up global oil prices — with Burnham reiterating UK support for ensuring Iran never acquires nuclear weapons.
The meeting was not without friction on one point: Trump again criticised the proposed Chagos Islands deal as "terrible." The agreement, negotiated under the previous government, would transfer sovereignty of the remote Indian Ocean archipelago to Mauritius while leasing back the strategically vital Diego Garcia military base, which the UK and US use jointly. Trump withdrew American support for the deal in April, effectively pausing it indefinitely. Burnham, who spoke to Mauritian Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam the day before the New York meeting, told reporters he had given assurances he would "work towards a resolution" but acknowledged that one does not currently exist. Separately, ahead of the meeting, the UK announced a milestone in defence cooperation: for the first time, a US heavyweight torpedo — designed to sink ships and submarines — had been fired from a British uncrewed underwater drone named Excalibur, built in Plymouth, in a test conducted in UK waters. The two governments also announced the start of a new AI and Autonomy partnership focused on protecting critical national infrastructure, a plan that drew immediate criticism from Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey, who called it insufficient and warned it risked making the UK "more dependent on a Trump administration in the pocket of the tech bros."