Where is the prime minister?
How long can Boris Johnson avoid Donald Trump for?
The two leaders were pictured together last night as part of a class photo of all the Nato leaders and members of the British Royal Family, but the British prime minister is desperate to avoid handing the Labour party a PR-freebie by associating too closely with the president who is deeply unpopular in the UK.
As the FT’s Henry Mance noted, while Mr Trump advanced on London yesterday, Mr Johnson fled to Salisbury, 78 miles away.
With eight days to go before the general election, the last thing Mr Johnson needs is to be near Mr Trump, a man with higher disapproval ratings in the UK than Vladimir Putin, Jean-Claude Juncker and even Labour’s Jeremy Corbyn.
Trump and tech tax on the agenda
Donald Trump is in town, and the president’s free-wheeling press conferences offer the near constant threat of upending the election campaign.
So far though, Mr Trump has been on his best behaviour – he told reporters yesterday he had “no thoughts” on the election and could work with anybody.
But will he be able to resist weighing in on the UK’s plans for a new digital tax?
Boris Johnson has risked escalating a European trade war with Mr Trump by vowing to push ahead with a British digital sales tax, hours after the US administration threatened to punish France for imposing a similar measure.
The prime minister’s comments came ahead of a Nato summit that he will attend with his American counterpart on Wednesday near London as tensions rose over new European tech levies. Mr Trump has claimed they unfairly discriminate against US companies such as Google, Apple and Facebook.
You can read the full details in this report from George Parker and Chris Giles in London and James Politi in Washington.
Welcome
Fireworks in London today? Boris Johnson has backed a UK digital sales tax in a move that could spark the ire of Donald Trump, who is in London for the Nato summit. Mr Trump lashed out at France over a similar measure that the US president says will hurt big US tech groups like Google-parent Alphabet.
We’re just eight days from the election now, so both campaigns are on the lookout for any exogenous shocks that could shake things up in a way they can’t control.
