- Leaders of the world’s most affluent countries are in Biarritz after Trump threw shade at several of them
- Threatened to tax French ‘like they’ve never seen before’ and said leaders at G7 are ‘friends for the most part’
- His kinship with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Trump’s only natural ally, will be put to test at the summit
- Trump’s relationship with France’s Emmanuel Macron is currently strained: the U.S. claims that the French leader hung the U.S. leader out to dry on Russia but the two will have an unscheduled lunch together Saturday
- G7 leaders except for Trump have said that that Russia should not be readmitted
- Trump and world leaders attending are expected to clash on several fronts – US wants to talk about trade and tariffs and Macron wants to focus on the climate
Donald Trump landed in France with First Lady Melania for the G7 summit Saturday, after taking a swipe at fellow leaders, calling them ‘friends of mine, for the most part’ but not in ‘100 percent of the cases’.
The president threw shade at some of America’s closest partners on Friday evening, mere hours before he’d see them in Biarritz at the Group of Seven summit.
He threatened to tax French ‘like they’ve never seen before’ and characterized world leaders attending the event as ‘friends for the most part’ in front of Marine One.
‘We’re going to France. We’ll have a good few days. I think it will be very productive, seeing a lot of leaders who are friends of mine, for the most part,’ he said of his trip, smirking as he added, ‘Wouldn’t say in 100 percent of the cases, but for the most part.’
He did not say which leaders were getting under his skin, but Trump offered several hints in the comments he delivered outside the White House before he left for Europe with first lady Melania.
She arrived into Biarritz wearing a yellow dress with pink stiletto heels and sunglasses. The first lady had departed Washington wearing a Chanel jacket, white pants and a black top.
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U.S. President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania arrive in Biarritz for the G7 summit on Saturday
The couple arrived after the president took a swipe at fellow leaders, calling them ‘friends of mine, for the most part’
Melania arrived wearing a yellow dress with pink stiletto heels and sunglasses. The couple are in France for the G7 summit
Trump harped on France’s digital tax, which he said U.S. tech companies don’t deserve. He noted that he’s ‘not the biggest fan of the tech companies,’ which he again accused them of interfering in his election.
Yet, he said, their regulation should be up to the United States, and not foreign countries like France.
‘I don’t like what France did. They put a digital tax on our tech companies,’ he said. ‘Those are great American companies, and frankly, I don’t want France going out and taxing our companies, very unfair.’
He cautioned French President Emmanuel Macron against moving ahead with the action that could spark a protracted trade war with the United States.
It is understood the two world leaders will have an unscheduled lunch together Saturday.
‘If they do that, we’ll be taxing their wine, or doing something else. We’ll be taxing their wine, like they’ve never seen before,’ Trump promised.
Whether he meant for the earlier jab about his ‘friends’ in the global community to land on Macron or another leader he’ll be seeing like German Chancellor Angela Merkel was unclear.
Donald and Melania Trump walk past French airforce soldiers after disembarking from an airplane upon landing in Biarritz
Donald Trump threw shade at some of America’s closest partners on Friday evening, mere hours before he’d see them in Biarritz at the Group of Seven summit. He is pictured flanked by his wife and US First Lady Melania Trump on Saturday
He did not say which leaders were getting under his skin, but Trump offered several hints in the comments he delivered outside the White House before he left for Europe with first lady Melania, who departed Washington wearing a Chanel jacket, white pants and a black to
French President Emmanuel Macron delivers a speech on environment and social equality to business leaders in Paris on the eve of the G7 summit that his nation is hosting this year
Trump has already cautioned French President Emmanuel Macron against moving ahead with the action that could spark a protracted trade war with the United States
The U.S. president is coming in hot on the economy and trade and plans to lobby fellow leaders to readmit Russia to the exclusive group that Trump will have his turn at running next year
Trump has a kinship with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson but their relationship will also be put to test this weekend when leaders of the world’s most affluent countries convene in France
Trump’s only natural ally among G7 nations – a group comprised of Germany, France, Italy, Canada , the US, the UK and Japan – Johnson will be caught in the crossfire
US President Donald Trump and his wife Melania wave from The Beast on the first day of the annual G7 Summit attended by the leaders of the world’s seven richest democracies
He threatened to tax French ‘like they’ve never seen before’ and characterized world leaders attending the event as ‘friends for the most part’ before he flew to France
The Trumps arrive in Europe on Saturday afternoon. The president is coming to Biarritz by way of Bordeaux
After his wine tax threat he’d added, ‘Other than that, I have a very good relationship with, Macron, as you say, and we’re going to have a very good couple of days. I look forward to being in France.’
‘I’m going to see Prime Minister Abe, he’s a great gentleman, a great friend of mine,’ he told another reporter asking about his relationship with Japan’s head of government.
Trump has a kinship with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson but their relationship will also be put to test this weekend when leaders of the world’s most affluent countries convene in France.
The U.S. president is coming in hot on the economy and trade and plans to lobby fellow leaders to readmit Russia to the exclusive group that Trump will have his turn at running next year.
Macron is pushing a climate change agenda that Trump has vociferously opposed and rejected a U.S.-circulated claim this week that he wants to include Vladimir Putin in future summits.
Trump’s only natural ally among G7 nations – a group comprised of Germany, France, Italy, Canada, the US, the UK and Japan – Johnson will be caught in the crossfire.
The conservative leaders have been strategizing in weekly calls for the past month.
‘He and I are very much aligned. We feel very good about each other,’ Trump said last week.
Johnson is Trump’s only natural ally among G7 nations – a group comprised of Germany, France, Italy, Canada, the US, the UK and Japan. The UK prime minister is pictured Friday in England
Trump is coming in hot on the economy and trade and plans to lobby fellow leaders to readmit Russia to the exclusive group
KEEP OUT: Biarritz is on high alert ahead of the G7, inconveniencing tourists in the area’s high season
A view shows the beach and the Hotel du Palais summit venue ahead of the G7 summit
In his trade stand-off with Beijing, the U.S. leader may find no better backer than the newly-ascendant Johnson, who is still considering whether to join Trump’s crusade against Chinese telecom firm Huawei.
A self-defined nationalist who has broken with fellow leaders on climate change, Russian aggression and the Iranian nuclear pact, Trump’s rejection of globalism and his distaste for multinational organizations is likely to leave him feeling unexpectedly isolated, even with Johnson at this year’s negotiating table.
The UK has remained steadfast in its partnership with regional allies on core issues, although Johnson’s interest in European priorities like global warming is softer than his immediate predecessors.
That support is unlikely to change even after Brexit, and Trump may be surprised by Johnson’s positions.
‘We’re obviously going to continue to see some really serious divergences,’ Leslie Vinjamuri, head of the US and the Americas Programme at Chatham House, told DailyMail.com. ‘You can’t just wait it out for your friend to run the country and then think that you’re going to move things along. Britain is a democracy. It’s got its own set of interests.’
On economic basics, Trump and Johnson have the same general worldview, which will benefit the U.S. president as he fights his own trade battle with the EU.
‘That’s really all we care about,’ White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said Thursday of the U.S. mission at the secluded conference.
Trump will be heralding a pro-jobs, pro-growth agenda centered on free, fair and reciprocal trade, another senior administration official said, outlining a U.S. push to return to the mandate of the group that’s comprised of the world’s most advanced economies.
‘These are critical agenda items that the President has done domestically. We’ve seen the results. We’ve seen hundreds of thousands of jobs coming back to the U.S. economy. And we’ve seen growth rates that we didn’t think were possible just a few years ago,’ the official said. ‘And you can contrast this to what’s happening in Europe, where growth is effectively flat.’
Trump at the summit will be ‘really engaging in honest conversations’ about these issues, said the adviser of the president’s desire to ‘ensure that U.S. workers and businesses have markets in which they can sell their goods and services’ within the world’s most lucrative economies.
The Wilson Center’s Matthew Rojansky told DailyMail.com that European nations will be equally interested to see behind the curtain of Trump’s trade practices.
‘With troubling economic signs on the horizon in U.S. markets and the ongoing U.S.-China trade dispute, this is likely to be the major focus of concern from U.S. allies at the summit,’ he said. ‘They will want to know what Washington plans to do to manage these threats to growth and prosperity.’
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau waves as he arrives in Biarritz, in south-west France on August 23, 2019, on the eve of the annual G7 Summit
source:dailymail
