Trump likes ‘liberal’ Starmer
Donald Trump has noted the below
I really like the prime minister a lot, even though he’s a liberal.
Donald Trump interviewed by the BBC 15th July 2025
Perhaps the first thing that comes to mind for socialists of a certain age is the late, a US musician Phil Ochs song ‘Love Me I’m a Liberal (and that’s why I’m turning you in) that is actually probably close to Trump’s meaning. Of course neither the BBC or Trump have heard of Ochs.
Trump does not mean that Starmer is either a liberal in the British sense (economically he likely is, socially he is not) or a Liberal Democrat. Blair has long argued for a return to the progressive liberal/labour politics of the late nineteenth century. The caveat here is that Blair knows nothing about labour history, this is my construction on his politics. Starmer however is not on that page. He does know something of labour history from his 1980s period, but chooses to try and forget about it.
Trump’s use of the word ‘liberal’ in the US sense means a moderate Democrat. It is an insult but as insults go he has much worse. He recently called the Democratic contender for New York Zohran Mamdani a ‘communist’ which he certainly is not, unfortunately. Trump will also use terms such as antifa and anarchist (and rarely Marxist) which covers a range of views, at least some of which might be called liberal in the UK but is not Trump’s meaning here.
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