In Donald Trump’s first term, governments around the world braced for his morning social media posts. What policy would be reversed, what insult thrown? Four years on, diplomats are once more getting twitchy when the sun rises on America’s east coast.
Back then, they learned to take Trump – as the adage had it – “seriously but not literally”. Despite many campaign promises, he did not take the US out of Nato or lock up Hilary Clinton. But can ministers stay so sanguine a second time around?
Trump’s latest morning salvo criticised the UK government’s decision to increase taxes on oil and gas firms working in the North Sea, in part to help fund renewable energy.
On his platform, Truth Social, Trump responded to a report about a US oil firm leaving the region, saying: “The U.K. is making a very big mistake. Open up the North Sea. Get rid of Windmills!”
Was this merely a familiar defence of a US firm by Trump and a repetition of his pro-fossil fuel instincts? Or was it evidence of a greater willingness by the president-elect to intervene in an ally’s own domestic policies?
The main difference – four years on – is that Trump is no longer alone at the keyboard; his increasingly powerful fellow traveller, Elon Musk, is even more prolific, using his own platform, X, to attack the British government across the board. He has criticised its handling of last summer’s riots, the running of the economy and now especially its attitude towards child abuse scandals.
Musk has issued a torrent of tweets attacking Sir Keir Starmer personally, accusing the prime minister of not doing enough to prosecute child grooming gangs while he was the director of public prosecutions.
British politicians cannot stem these posts from across the Atlantic. But they can control their reaction. During Trump’s first term, governments – and news desks – learned to pause and take a moment before responding to – or reporting – the latest electronic missives from the White House.
Thus far the Conservatives have chosen to engage with and echo Musk’s agenda. The party leader, Kemi Badenoch, said a full national inquiry into organised grooming gangs was “long overdue”.
But the Conservatives balked at Musk’s apparent support for the jailed far-right activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, also known as Tommy Robinson.
Musk has shared several posts on X calling for the release of Yaxley-Lennon, who was jailed in October after admitting contempt of court by repeating false claims against a Syrian refugee.
Alicia Kearns, the Conservative shadow safeguarding minister, said it was “frankly dangerous” of Musk to be “lionising people like Tommy Robinson”.
As for Labour, it seems keen to avoid picking a fight with one of the world’s richest men who could one day fund a rival political party. Nigel Farage’s Reform Party has said Musk is among “a number of billionaires” interested in donating money for their campaigns.
Health Secretary Wes Streeting said Musk’s comments about child grooming scandals were “misjudged and certainly misinformed” but asked the billionaire to work with the UK government to tackle online child abuse.
UK politicians are not alone in being the target of Musk’s increasingly eccentric interventions. He has described Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany as a “fool” and the country’s head of state, President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, as “an anti-democratic tyrant”. He has also called President Justin Trudeau of Canada “an insufferable tool” who “won’t be in power for much longer”.
Monitoring closely
So the challenge once again for politicians in Britain and around the world is to work out which, if any, of these social media outbursts and interventions merit a response.
In Whitehall, there is some hope the arrival of Lord Mandelson as the new British ambassador might help stem the flow of personal vituperation across the Atlantic.
There is also weight being placed on Trump’s affection for the UK and the Royal Family; he had a good meeting with the Prince of Wales in Paris in December after the opening of Notre Dame.
Other officials are even musing that the relationship between Trump and Musk might prove too combustible in office.
But for now officials are monitoring their timelines closely. US social media diplomacy is back and some of it is heading our way.
