Trump rips Theresa May in phone call, echoes Macron, Trudeau attack

British
Prime Minister Theresa May walks with US President Donald Trump
at Chequers on July 13, 2018
Jack
Taylor/Getty Images

• President Donald Trump berated UK Prime Minister Theresa May
  over the phone on Friday, according to a report.
• The aggressive call came while Trump was traveling to Paris
  for a tense weekend meeting to commemorate the 100th anniversary
  of the World War I armistice.
• Trump also clashed openly with French President Emmanuel
  Macron during the trip.
• The battles with May and Macron are the latest example of
  Trump’s abrasive style when meeting international leaders.

UK Prime Minister Theresa May reportedly was on the receiving end
of a tantrum from President Donald Trump, the latest instance of
fraught relations between the president and some of America’s
closest allies.

According to a
report from The Washington Post, May called Trump on Friday
to congratulate him on the GOP picking up a few Senate seats in
the midterm elections. But May was subsequently treated to a
verbal lashing, the report said.

Trump reportedly blasted May over Iran, the state of Brexit
negotiations, and the US-European Union trade relationship.

Trump’s anger caught May and her aides off guard, The Washington
Post said, despite the fact the prime minister has been on the
receiving end of such behavior previously.

While the episode comes as something of a shock, especially
considering Trump’s fairly cordial trip to the UK in July, the
row is also part of a growing trend of Trump lashing out at
allied leaders.

The Macron fight

In addition to berating May over the phone, Trump also spent an
entire weekend in Paris feuding with other world leaders —
particularly the weekend’s host, French President Emmanuel
Macron.

A bromance that had already been
strained by trade tensions appeared to
completely fall apart after Macron suggested to French radio
that Europe needs to build up its defense forces to protect
against possible threats, including the US.

While the French president insisted the reference to the US was
only to imply that Europe needed to rely less on the US,
Trump launched into a days-long tirade against Macron and
France.

The fight became more intense after Macron
publicly denounced “nationalism” during a speech Sunday.

Trump has repeatedly used the term to describe himself in
recent weeks. According to The Washington Post, Trump took the
comments as a personal attack.

The frosty meeting culminated in
Trump’s Twitter attacks on Tuesday that went after Macron’s
approval rating, France’s trade treatment of US wines, and
even France’s
World War II record.

Not the first time

Trump’s back and forth with European leaders isn’t the only time
in recent memory that the president has clashed with the US’s
closest allies during an international trip.

In June, Trump fought with a variety of theoretically friendly
world leaders at
the G7 summit in Canada. During those meetings, Trump held
awkward meetings with a slew of foreign leaders, including:

• An encounter with
  German Chancellor Angela Merkel during which Trump
  tossed a Starburst candy onto the table and said, “Here,
  Angela. Don’t say I never give you anything.”
• A meeting during which Trump complained about immigration and
  told Japanese
  Prime Minister Shinzo Abe that if the US were to “send
  him 25 million Mexicans,” the prime minister would be “be
  out of office very soon.”
• A battle with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in which
  Trump made him the target
  of an extended Twitter tirade before, during, and after the
  meeting.

While the fights add a layer of personal intrigue, they could
also have some real world policy consequences.

The personal animus between Trudeau and Trump
appeared to cause a delay in final negotiations over the
updated North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) in August,
while Macron and Merkel have ramped up calls for a pan-European
defense force in the wake of Trump’s NATO skepticism.

While these spats are unlikely to undermine lengthy
relationships, Trump’s brash nature could cause consequential
shifts in how the world treats the US.

The next chance for international fireworks comes at the end of
November, when Trump is scheduled to travel to Argentina for the
G20 summit. Most importantly Trump is set to hold his first
face-to-face meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping since the
start of the US-China trade war.