Chris Mason: Starmer questioned about Biden’s faux pas at NATO summit
From the exit polls to the White House balcony, it’s been quite a week for Sir Keir Starmer.
The Prime Minister is clearly enjoying his new role after nine years in opposition.
He traveled to Washington for the NATO summit of the defense alliance. His government was not yet complete. As we flew across the Atlantic, I received news of ministerial appointments.
From vote-seeking one week to major diplomacy the next, that’s quite a fortnight – and perhaps something that, in an ideal world, the new administration would not choose.
But while governance can influence many things, it is not enough to influence the planning of international summits.
Image source, Getty Images
The NATO summit in the American capital has been on the calendar for months.
Whoever the Prime Minister was, he would have shown up whether there were elections or not.
Even though there were still jobs available and Sir Keir himself had only just been reinstated in Parliament, the airport was tempting.
And so the attempt began to use the backlog of appointments to their advantage.
“It was great to be able to meet so many leaders here in my first full week in office,” a senior aide to the prime minister told me.
“It shortened a process that would otherwise have taken months to complete.
“That meant we could make the most of the momentum that came out of the election and, while interest in Keir was at its highest, we could address all the strategic issues we wanted and differentiate ourselves from our predecessors.”
The Prime Minister sought to place his “unwavering” commitment to NATO in the Labour Party tradition.
“I represent the party that played a key role in the founding of NATO 75 years ago.
“It was Labour Prime Minister Clement Attlee and Labour Foreign Secretary Ernie Bevin who fought so hard to make this a reality.
“This is our history – we are proud of it,” he told us in his final press conference.
He added that the alternative to Ukraine’s victory was “unthinkable”.
But the issue that dominates the national debate in the United States – the future of President Biden – gained renewed momentum when the 81-year-old confused the heads of state of Ukraine and Russia just moments before the prime minister’s press conference.
At the end of a NATO summit dominated by the war in Ukraine and several weeks dominated by questions about President Biden’s mental faculties and political future, this was just about the worst faux pas imaginable.
When these words were spoken, there was an audible gasp in the press room. Reporters from all over the world were speechless at what they had just heard.
Moments later, Sir Keir Starmer not only witnessed this extremely embarrassing moment, but also had to face repeated questions about it.
The Prime Minister had previously given a series of interviews with the travelling British press, including myself, asking him about his impressions of the President after spending about an hour with him for the first time the day before.
Essentially, he was a character witness in this heated debate in the United States and around the world about Joe Biden’s ability to move on and run for re-election in the fall.
However, recent evidence suggests that this was not actually the case.
Sir Keir repeatedly insisted on this formulation – that the President Biden he had experienced had achieved much at the conference of which he could be proud.
What else could he really say?
American Airlines and flight attendants union to convene in Washington DC on Saturday as a decision on strike looms
New book examines the cultural roots of our political crisis
The cast of “The Thursday Murder Club” expands to include Richard E. Grant, Tom Ellis and more
About The Author
