The US President insisted to Sir Keir Starmer that Sadiq Khan did not attend any state visit events and Donald Trump called him “one of the worst mayors in the world.”
On Thursday evening onboard Air Force Once the US President told journalists after his historic second state visit that he insisted the London Mayor must not be invited to the state dinner on Wednesday evening at Windsor Castle.
Trump told journalists on Air Force One, I “didn’t want” Khan to attend the State Banquet at Windsor Castle as he is “one of the worst mayors in the world.”
Trump told GB News Bev Turner, “I didn’t want him there.
“I asked that he not be there.
I think the mayor of London Khan is among the worst mayors in the world, and we have some bad ones…
He blasted the London Mayor saying that the capital’s crime rates are “through the roof.”
Trump added, “He wanted to be there. As I understand it, I didn’t want it.
“I’ve not liked him for a long time.
“I just think, you know, I have a certain pride in London and the UK, my mother was born in Scotland, and when I see Mayor Khan do a bad job – the stabbings, the dirt and the filth – it’s not the same. I didn’t want him there.”
Before Trump’s visit Khan wrote in the Guardian, “President Donald Trump and his coterie have perhaps done the most to fan the flames of divisive, far-right politics around the world in recent years.
When he came to the UK on his first state visit, I highlighted how the president had deliberately used xenophobia, racism and ‘otherness’ as an electoral tactic, introducing a travel ban on a number of Muslim-majority countries and praising white nationalists in Charlottesville, Virginia.
“Six years later, the tactics we see from today’s White House seem no different. Scapegoating minorities, illegally deporting US citizens, deploying the military to the streets of diverse cities.
“These actions aren’t just inconsistent with Western values – they’re straight out of the autocrat’s playbook.”
