Special: President Trump in Europe

we've lost seventy two hours. What does this mean for breaksit? Well, first of all, it's unprecedented for a sitting president United States during a state visit to attack and ally and do it so publicly and endorse one of her rivals for that position. It's unprecedented in its outrageous. The second point it's an import is that the comments were just,

you know, not on the mark. A lot of US businesses, as you know and use your viewers would know, have invested in the UK as a gateway to Europe, just like the Japanese have. So in fact, many of those businesses want UK regulations to remain aligned with those of the EU. The second point is important is that a lot of the regulations that the US complains about and that the President and Wilbert Ross wanted the UK to ditch. Are those agricultural regulations that impede US exporters from selling

GMO products and hormone treated beefs on? Those things aren't going to change. But I guess what I was trying to get in my question is, you know, the President of United States shows up saying maybe it's Boris Johnson that should be Prime minister? Does the UK rally for the prime minister? Does it actually make her stronger? I

think they probably will. We've seen a lot of reactions so far, mostly from the Labor Party, but I think we'll see a lot of reactions as well from the Tory saying it's just not appropriate for president to be interfering in the UK politics in this way. Ambassador, probably all want to go to Venice and hide in the Peggy looking On collection today, where you've provided leadership, that would be a good place to get out of the storm.

You are one of the singular American voices, your cross section of law and diplomacy as well in this cacophony that we see here, How does Washington extract itself to a president? Obama would say, and I would suggest President Trump as well, to a better place out of the endless and ceaseless noise that we have. What are Republicans on the hill have to do? What are Democrats have to do? What do these institutions have to do. That's a great question and there is no clear answer to it.

But this is my answer to your question. I think US business does have to speak up. Now. This is not a part of an issue. This is important, it is not a part as an issue. Just to ask the question, how is any of this advancing US interests, particularly US business interests? When we withdraw from international trade, When the EU sets its standards globally, including an agriculture on data protection wise and we're not, how does it

advance US interests? Two days after Brexit, Francie and I were still trying to get through the debris that that evening and into the next morning. I remember ubs purchased a property or went from least to ownership or whatever on the River Thames. We're going to hear from James Diamond today and is JP Morgan earnings. What does someone like Jamie Diamond have to say to suggest to President Trump this behavior, this tabloid is not in the best interests of all What does Jamie have to do well?

The basic point is remember who your allies are and who your enemies are. Let's stop confusing the two. We need to work with our allies, including the European Union, who are natural partners at advancing our interests, particularly on trade. On the business interests or your viewers are particularly interested in. That means, for example, identifying the issues where the presidents correctly identified as being problematic IP theft market access to

various countries, not only China. We should be working with the EU as we have been in the past on those issues, rather than being at war with the EU on cars and on aluminum and on steel. That's the basic point, right, But a mess this helps with his popularity. Right.

We're close to the midterm elections, so actually America going out of a loan a strong man president that can get a deal with China sounds better than going through allies in Europe and trying to figure out what we do with I p Yes, but that's short term thinking. I think businesses should be in the business of mid term and long term thinking as well. Um and we will soon see the consequences of a potentially a trillion dollar trade war on US exporters. A lot of people

are assuming that this is just negotiating tactics. Right. The President knows what he's doing. He's a good negotiator, successful businessman. It'll all sort itself out. Be careful about that kind of you know thinking, because I don't see a strategy behind this. Businesses need to warren as President Isabelle. What's precedent in the markets? Do markets need to warn President Trump?

I think they do. Another, I think they are and in fact we're I'm sure again we're going to hear in the earnings called some some some stronger language from from the corporate world that that came out clearly from the five minutes that were published last week. The businesses are beginning to to speak. And as I was saying earlier, the markets, you know, are pricing in a much higher risk premium in every asset class under the sun than

they did last year. Why is that? It's in large part because of all this uncertainty that that the US policies have been creating. In your government studies at Harvard and then on to Oxford and the Columbia law all the track of Anthony Gardner. What I find so important here is you know, an event after event, the unpredictable happens. Are we set up right now for the unpredictable abilities that we heard financially, what we saw out of the

Soviet Union? Are we at that instability within Europe right now? Well, we're sending a lot of negative signals, and signals communication and words matter. Even if all of this is sorted out, we're sending dangerous signals about how the president is at least ambivalent about our alliances NATO in the EU. That's dangerous. Look at historical historical evidence. Are the Baltic states at risk here? I mean we're talking about Georgia and the rest of the tangential in Ukraine. Are the Baltic states

at risk? I think they feel that they're at risk, and it empowers those who believe that those frontline states actually may not be defended at a time of need. Let's look at historical experience. When both sides mobilized, there comes a point when it's very hard to withdraw. I'm talking about the trade war here. We are at an inflection point. Very good, Let's come back, Combassador Gardener, where this and we will continue, and of course Isabelle Lago

as well from black Rock. This wonderful conversation to get the day started. In London. Alex Wayne is the guy in the trenches who takes all the different copy from the reporters and makes it ready for Bloomberg News, Bloomberg dot Com and of course for how many sources that uses worldwide. We've dragged him away. He's working his phone here, Lisa. It's embarrassing. His phone looks like he dropped it four times in a bar last night. But you're glued to

the phone with nine reporters right now. What are the people in checkers saying? It's pretty quiet up there? You know? He's he played down the Sun interview when he when he met with May, he said they have a very very strong relationship. May was we couldn't we couldn't hear very well for one thing. But she she, she seemed like and they seemed to be getting along. Account helber Adi, it's you're based in London or Washington. I'm based in Washington.

Based in Washington. There's the Washington Post, in the New York Times, in Bloomberg News, and I love two days this week Mike Allen and Axios led twice with Bloomberg copy. Everybody's grinding it out. But the tabloid thing, I mean, you're a pro journalist. I'm just pretending. The bottom line, Alex is the tabloid tone in the United Kingdom is way different than Washington and frankly way different than Mr

Murdock's New York Post as well. What did you think of the presentation of the interview by the Sun. Uh, you know, I've actually enjoyed it reading as a as a reader, I found it a pretty pleasurable experience and just kept going on and on and giving and giving more and more. Now they do some stuff on their website with ads and things that are a little distracting, and uh and but I but I did like the

way they organized it. They sort of broke it up into different sections with pictures, and you know, he covered a lot of ground with them. Three right, one of my at least, so one of my producers, Bowden ripped, I go, where's page three? And he goes ripped it out and I said why, he said, shut up? Time, just go on. I love I love the the u S analysis of the Sun. There were a lot of

nice pictures. No, Alex, I do want to get a sense of the broader implications here of President Trump going after Theresa May and frankly showing a lot of affection towards barn Boris Johnson Um and sort of saying, if you know that the Brexit deal that Theresa May is putting out there isn't what the US is talking about, isn't what the the UK isn't what the UK population voted for in the U S could potentially cut its trade,

some of its trade relationships or deals. Why what is this significant not only for Britain but just in terms of President Trump's sentiment right now? Short answer, No, not really, alright, you know everybody everybody in the UK is very exercised about the interview. Oh my gosh, he cut Theresa Mays at knees out from underneath her. It's probably helpful for I mean, he's not very popular in the UK, not

very popular in the US. Uh. If he's attacking the Prime minister, I think that probably makes a lot of Britain sympathetic toward her position. Hold on one second, this is actually really important. We need to highlight this. You're saying that by President Trump trying to cut down the UK Prime Minister Theresa May. He's actually giving her more clout with the population and could potentially give her more

power heading into Brexit negotiations. I think he could help ear and I have a feeling she has a has her finger closer to the pulse of what what Britain's want and a Brexit deal than he does. When we look at Kevin's really coming here. Was traveled with the president since the very beginning. Wait, you know when nobody thought he would be even his supporters think he'd become president. In the grind that you're in, alex Wayne every day,

how has the president changed in the last year? And then in the day to day grind, what do you observe? Is he the same as he was a year ago? Or has it been changes? Man? That's deep? Um you do this Friday? Also, I went to a Croatian bar last night, so seriously changed. I think his his relationship

with the press has gotten more complex. Uh, And I think I think that this Annapolis shooting recently kind of put a put a sort of highlighted that, Um he you know, he's always demonized us in front of his supporters and then dealt with us on the back end. But uh, you know, he's he's been spending a lot of time with us lately on all these foreign trips. Um he's been. There's been a lot of lengthy conference was and now he didn't give us much notice about

the press. But quickly here he spoke nicely to Margaret to love as well. He did what was stunning he did, he did, He's he's uh, he seems he's developed a relationship with Margaret, with Jennifer Jacobs, with some of the other reporters. Um, So you know, I think he's Even when he was ripping us at his rallies, I thought it was mostly for show. It's it's really become quite clearly. And I want you to stay here, but your entourages out through the window of our London studios saying Mr

Wayne has to go back to his real job. Alex Wayne, thank you so much, folks. It's just a window into our lead editor of our Brexit team. We drive forward our conversation on Bloomberg surveillance, as we did it with Ambassador Gardener in the last hour, with another ambassador from the United Kingdom and their former ambassador of the United States, also serving as ambassador to France and to Turkey as well.

Peter Wassmancutt joining us this morning, Ambassador, thank you so much for finding time on this just exceptionally unique day. As well. There is a moment in the John Adams television series where the acclaimed actor Paul Giamati is Johnny Adams goes in to meet the king after the Revolution. Stunning scene, at least for ugly Americans like me. He backs out of the room. Now, I'm assuming the President will not back out of the room today were the

queen when they have tea. But after what we've seen in this tabloid, how will the Queen of England greet this President of the United States. The Queen has a lot of experience of dealing with visiting statesman she's met, and a a lot of presidents post to the United States and elsewhere. My hunch from my own experience is that this will be super correct. It will be cordial.

There will be conversation about relatively unpolitical issues. I would be surprised if her Majesty asks about, you know, the Sun editorial and so on, But but who knows. So I think this is a meeting, which is which is largely a courtesy t at the Castle of windsor give great pleasure to the first lady. I'm sure it will give great pleasure to the President. But this is not a conversation I don't think, which is like did to

go into the substance in any great depth? Will the nation rally around the Prime minister after what we've seen here? Will labor Tory? Will people not attached the politics? Will they rally around the Prime Minister? Well, I think there's a sense that this is a pretty unpleasant payback to the Prime Minister who's gone out of her way to give Donald Trump almost in all the detail, an equivalent of a state visit without him being a state visit.

Red carpet, blendim palace, tea with the Queen, all the other stuff which has been laid on, And this is a bit of a kick in the teeth, frankly to the Prime Minister. I don't know what it's designed to achieve. I noticed that the President was not kind of renting. He was calm and deliberate while he was giving an interview. Was it something he had been encouraged to do in order to strengthen the hard Brexit is here in British

domestic politics. Was it something she decided to do because it was the opposite of what President Obama had done, which was to come to London and support UM not doing Brexit at David Cameron's request, and he decided he would come to then Um and take the opposite view, mind you, this time undermining the prime minister of the country,

not supporting the prime minister country. I do not know, but I think we are in we are in different territory and it's not helpful to the prime minister position, and there could be some sort of a backlash saying, you know what, whether we agree or whether we don't agree what she's trying to do. This is not fair, right, But is she also weakened by it? I'm not sure that I can. I don't have a view on that yet.

I think we wait to see. Initially, I think she's a bit weakened because what it does is point out the contradictions which we all know are unresolved within the government's position on how to handle Brexit. When President Trump says BI natural trade deal with neither the States is off, I think he's a little out of date because he's looking at the time when the Brexit package appeared to be one which excluded the right for the UK to

have any bilactural free trade agreements. The Prime Minister has since been in Parliament saying, actually it doesn't we can negotiate those free trade agreements. So whether she's weak or not, I don't know, but I don't think this helps the relationship and the perception of Donald Trump here in the United Kingdom. Okay, Is it because Donald Trump actually sees parallels between Brexit and his own election? Is that why he's weighing in or is it because he's simply friends

with Boris Johnson. I think in one sense we're seeing his preference for bilateral deals. He doesn't like multilateral doesn't like NATO, EU, all those countries coming together, and he thought the answer was a deal between himself and the UK, and he saw that perhaps disappearing. I think that's part of it. The Boris Johnson thing puzzles me because bald Boris Johnson was one of the British politicians who was

rudest about Donald Trump during the campaign. Since then, he's been flattering him, saying how marvelous he is, so obviously something has changed in that relationship. Beyond that, does he really think Boris Johnson gonna become Prime Minister? Hut. We want to come back and continue this discussion. But you are one of the few people alive today understand the special relationship of the United Kingdom in France where you served, in the United States where you served. This triangle of

three centuries of relationship is really at risk here. How do we extricate ourselves from this moment to get back to what the United Kingdom, France and America once had. It's an extraordinary good question. When I was in Paris, there was an element of the bilateral relationship being special and entente cordial, and some British politicians wanted to focus exclusively on the United States. The French saw it a

bit more triangular. My own view was that with Britain and France the only two serious European powers in defense and intelligence and so on, that it was important for all three of us to work together. And when you look at the moment when we countries of the leaders of the free world, if you like hav Inter been militarily often, the three of us have been in there Iraq being a great exception, of course, back in two thousand and three. So getting this relationship working again very important.

I think President Emmanuel Macros has done a very good job of Matt. He has stood up to Donald Trump. He has also lavished praise on him. He's had him to Paris for the vast Year Days celebrations. But he's also just are you with him when he's needed to do so. Theresa May has done so because there've been numerous occasions when British and French views on international affairs have been contradicted or even undermined by President Trump. So we have to get that relationship back. It's a very

good point to make. How we do it remains to be seen. Peter Westcott, thank you so much. He's, of course a former UK ambassador to the US. We need not to go to the White House and our Kevin Sally Kevin a press conference with a certain level of joviality. Have you ever seen him say I'm not going to take a question from CNN? Was that a first or is that business as usual for you animals that cover

the president? Business as usual? Business as usual? Look, and obviously we should know our our intrepid colleagues with PNN.

You great work over there, But but I want to make a here because it's fascinating to note that after that black high affair yesterday, President Trump, as he left that that dinner with the UK Prime Minister Theresa May see Rupert Murdoch owned The Sun published this uh, this interview uh, and as it was made public, flash forward to this morning and loving when the President says that he apologized to the UK Prime Minister and she brushed it off and said, quote unquote, this is just the press.

So it was an interesting display and an illustration of how the special relationship between the US and the UK has evolved in the Trump era. Also note that, more importantly, from a policy standpoint, UK Prime Minister Theresa May saying that President Trump is going into the July sixty meeting with President Who in hell Sinky from a quote unquote position of strength and a unified NATO, the President saying that he secured thirty four billion dollars additional funding Canado.

Oh within that, Kevin, is the preparation, preparation for what you and I will see monday in Helsinki. Tell us what's different about the preparation for this summit from any other big meeting that President Trump would have. There were certainly the preparation for the Singapore summit. What's different and

how he's preparing the expectations. The President said point blank that he doesn't have high expectations that he's the administration is really going out of its way to manage expectations with this President Trump and President Putin meeting, the President saying that he barely knows President Putin, that he's only met with him to two and a half times his work, his counting, I don't know how you need someone to have fun, but uh, and I think that from a

from an agenda standpoint. More importantly, senior administration officials as well as the President saying that the main topics the conversation will be UH, disarmament, UH, Ukraine, Syria, and yes election medally on the issue of crimea, particularly from an energy sector standpoint, tom the President did not forecast at all during this press conference when he was repeatedly asked what his policy would be, or how he or what outcome even he is hoping to articulate the President Photin

with regard to crimea. Kevin SURREALI one topic that did not get mentioned, but that could be described as a sort of in the center of Syria and Crimea as well as what is going on inside the European Union and NATO, and that is Turkey. And uh, I'm wondering if there's any thought that you've or any based on your conversations, whether anyone has been talking about what is

happening in Turkey. You have Turkish government bond yields tenure yields near seventeen percent, you have the Turkish leer trading at a record low against the US dollar, and at the same time Turkeys looking to by Russian missile systems and US mad F thirty five joint strike fighters. Yes, and I think that that is from a broader context.

You correct, there has been no direct connection of Turkey in the last week or comments from Turkey Bostly administration publicly forecasting remarks regarding Ukraine and Crimea, but with regards to the Turkey in particular, I think this is where the NATO negotiations really become interesting, particularly but the President asserting that he has been able to ulster NATO funding that, according to Prime Minister May, is something that gets the

president an upper hand in the Putin Trump meeting or summit call, which one uh in hell stinky, I would quickly note. And Tom when we talked about this every morning about how you know, we make light of it. But but just from the from the moment that we're in, if you look at the names and how President Trump

is presenting himself, Rupert Murdoch owned the sun. Uh, this was this is President trump embrace thing, the triangulation of presenting himself European stage of Nile Farage, Deep Bannon, a senior economic adviser, Peter Navarrow, Kevin Curlie, please stay with us. We're now seeing the cars at checkers on a very brown grass field. The heat here, folks has been really stunning.

All of the parks of London are brown brown brown, uh and dry dry dry, And the helicopter waiting to take the president of course t scheduled at Windsor today, Kevin with within the dance here is immigration and that is something that clearly ties every modern nation together. Review for our global audience and our American audience, how the president is doing in the polls. I have told many people this week in London that when the President mentions

his beliefs on immigration. It's not a small, small, any minority interest. How is he doing in the polls? The base of the Republican Party is very much with him. He remains incredibly popular amongst Republicans. Congress remains incredibly unpopular. Uh and and I would note for the global audience, there was a fascinating scene earlier this week for President

Trump really taking head on German Chancellor Angela Merkel. That plays incredibly well the independent voters, particularly when he's arguing that other countries ought to be putting the bill in NATO. Now there is rightful criticism of the president mathematical assertion of that, uh and and and people can have that policy debate, but from a pure political standpoint, not a

policy standpoint. That moment where the President is speaking on behalf of American taxpayers is that plays well according to the political advisors that I speak with here in Washington, on both sides of the Aisle. UH. Independent voters in states like Wish, Michigan, with consinent Pennsylvania Kevin Sirley, thank you so much. Really look forward to seeing you UH in Helsinki here in the next twelve to UH twenty four hours, Kevin as surly as our chief Washington corresponded,

Thanks for listening to the Bloomberg Surveillance podcast. Subscribe and listen to interviews on Apple Podcasts, SoundCloud, or whichever podcast platform you prefer. I'm on Twitter at Tom Keane before the podcast. You can always catch us worldwide. I'm Bloomberg Radio