British politicians have for a long time seen America as the bigger brother. Labour strategists, especially during the “New Labour” days of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, would flock to Democrat conventions, in awe of Bill Clinton and Barack Obama. Conservatives have seen the Republican Party as their lodestar. Between Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, the affection was deep and genuine.
The supplication has not changed. What has changed is the politics. The MAGA movement has for several years been putting down roots in London. With think tanks, social media consultants, behind-the-scenes wargaming, and public events—all supported by considerable American money—the United Kingdom, often described as “Broken Britain,” is the favored destination for the export of Trumpism. Its backers are thinking long term, beyond Trump himself, even beyond arch-Brexiter and now head of the Reform UK party, Nigel Farage, and, of course, beyond the man who is notionally standing in their way, Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
Brexit was phase one. In April 2016, two months before the referendum, Obama used a trip to the United Kingdom to warn that it would go “to the back of the queue” in any trade deals. He was denounced for interference, a criticism that now feels somewhat quaint.
For those around Trump, a Britain decoupled from Europe opened countless opportunities. They prepared for the long haul. A business-like but frosty relationship with former Prime Minister Theresa May was followed by the mateyness but ideological emptiness of her successor Boris Johnson. Trump’s absence from the White House coincided with the final disintegration of Conservative rule under the hapless Liz Truss and luckless Rishi Sunak.
Labour’s Lost Victory
A Labour victory in 2024 seemed inevitable. What has stunned the MAGA team is how easily a government that ought to have been stable and long term has imploded.
Winning a landslide victory with 412 seats in the 650 seat-House of Commons (a majority of initially 174) in July 2024, Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer was expected to rule calmly and competently, marking the start of long period of Labour in office. A cascade of self-enforced errors, internal rebellion over proposed social welfare cuts, and the forced high-level resignation of Labour’s deputy leader, Angela Rayner, have led to a first year to forget.
With the Conservatives much diminished with only 121 MPs and under the incompetent leadership of Kemi Badenoch, it is the right-wing populist Reform UK party led by arch-Brexiter (and Trump buddy) Nigel Farage that has surged. While only winning five seats in 2024, it made strong forays in council elections in May 2025. Last summer, Reform UK overtook Labour in the polls. Which has given MAGA a much bigger opportunity.
Starmer and Trump
For the moment, Trump is “playing” Starmer reasonably well and Starmer is surviving Trump reasonably well. The relationship is based on certain shared interests, accompanied by sycophancy from the prime minister and an uncharacteristic discretion (some of the time) from the president. Together with the Germans and French, Starmer does what he can to mitigate the American damage on Ukraine. Through ingratiation, he secures marginally better tariffs than the EU. On intelligence, the Five Eyes—the US, the UK, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada—is bearing up, just.
Disquiet in London over the Trump policy of simply bombing alleged drug-smuggling boats out of Caribbean waters, however, has led to the UK no longer sharing all its intelligence with Washington.
On other issues, Starmer does what he can to avoid crashing the diplomatic car. The royal family comes in handy for that. The second Trump state visit to the UK in September was a masterclass in fawning, but it succeeded on its own terms. It bought the British government more time. The problem is that the prime minister has played his final card. It’s unlikely he could invite Trump a third time (though never say never in these curious times) and he does not determine who gets the Nobel Peace Prize.
With his Hebridean mother’s heritage and his golf courses, Trump embraces his Scottish links. His “private” visit last summer allowed him to play a few rounds and play king to a few courtiers, such as European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. Amid a heavy police and security (which led to an argument between the Scottish and UK governments about who should pay), protesters were kept far beyond the grounds of his luxury Scottish resort at Turnberry.
Vance’s Party Planner
The more important action last summer, however, took place further south—in the Cotswolds to the west of Oxford, a wealthy and picturesque collection of stone villages now dubbed the Hamptons of the UK. It was here that JD Vance, the intensely ideological vice president and likely successor to Trump, chose to spend part of his vacation.
In a sign of the enduring flexibility of Conservative principles, George Osborne, former Chancellor of the Exchequer (finance minister) when the Tories portrayed themselves as liberal and environmental, took it upon himself to be Vance’s party planner.
He arranged a series of dinners and teas for the Vances to meet Britons “of note.” The guests included not Kemi Badenoch, the current Conservative leader who is seen as largely irrelevant by the Trumpians, but her ambitious deputy, Robert Jenrick. Another former moderate, Jenrick has swung to the nativist cause with all the zeal of the recent convert.
Jenrick assumes that, on dislodging Badenoch (something which is regarded by his supporters as “when” rather than “if”), the Tories will find common cause in a coalition government with Reform. Unlike Germany, there is little talk of a “firewall.” The parties often share platforms and the defection of Tories to Reform continues steadily.
A House in Tufton Street
A string of Conservatives, from Jenrick to Truss to Priti Patel, another defeated leadership candidate who is now shadow foreign secretary, have made the pilgrimage to Washington to give talks at the Heritage Foundation, the think tank behind Project 2025, the blueprint for the second Trump administration.
Heritage has deeps links to a cluster of British think tanks. Over the years, several have set up shop in a Georgian townhouse, 55 Tufton Street, in the heart of Westminster. These range from Leave Means Leave (which lobbied for the hardest possible Brexit), the Institute for Economic Affairs and Taxpayers’ Alliance (classic neo-liberal/small state), to anti LGBTQ, pro fossil-fuel and climate change outfits. According to an investigation by media websites Byline Times and Democracy For Sale, donors to these London groups have given tens of millions of dollars to the Trump cause.
Think tanks on both sides of the Atlantic often work in tandem, producing reports presented as academic papers, holding conferences and coordinating media attack lines. I wrote about the National Conservatism Conference in 2023. A MAGA alternative to Davos is said to be under consideration.
While certain national differences remain (the Brits wouldn’t contemplate abolishing the National Health Service, though a radical change to its model is advocated), most policy areas are coalescing—on immigration, cutting state services, and an acute focus on culture war issues, such as DEI.
In terms of presentation, the aim is to spread fear, talking up societal collapse. The ultra-right are outperforming the Conservatives (and Labour) on social media. Reform has over 400,000 followers on TikTok, and Farage himself has over 1 million followers on the platform, which is used predominantly by younger people.
Their success could be further enhanced by the Labour government’s decision to grant the vote to 16 and 17-year-olds. It had been thought that these Gen Alphas would opt for liberal-left options. Opinion polls suggest it’s not as clear as that, as many young people across Europe are turning to parties like Vox in Spain, the RN in France and the AfD in Germany.
A few hundred meters away from Tufton Street, in a much larger building of much less grandeur, is a newer organization. The Centre for a Better Britain (CBB) was established in early 2025 as the brains trust of Reform. It is housed in offices in the same Millbank Tower skyscraper—which has over time provided headquarters for the Labour Party of Tony Blair and for the groups advocating a re-run of the Brexit referendum.
The CBB’s chair is a theology scholar at Cambridge, James Orr. The 47-year-old, who is also friends with US Vice President Vance, has already become a figurehead of British religion-based conservatism, until recently a rarefied concept, and the organization already has considerable financial backing.
Fox News Lookalike
Behind many of these new stars is Sir Paul Marshall, a hedge funder whose net worth is estimated to approach €1 billion. Marshall has over time morphed from supporting the Liberal Democrats to the Tories and is now bankrolling The Spectator magazine, the iconoclastic right-wing website Unherd, and the Fox News-lookalike GB News.
The British TV station recently hosted a launch party in Washington attended by several key Trump allies, many Trump wannabes, and whose guest of honor was Farage. Speaker after speaker referred to him as “Britain’s next prime minister.” Meanwhile, Trump’s is attempting to sue the BBC for up to $5 billion for splicing together two quotes of his about the January 2021 assault on Congress, while his spokeswoman, Karoline Leavitt, has denounced the embattled corporation as “total 100 percent fake news.”
During its sojourn in DC, GB News was granted an interview—or rather audience—with the president, during which the presenter lamented London’s violent crime rate (which is considerably below Washington’s). She also described Trump’s state visit to the UK as “beautiful. Incredible. I’ve never seen anything like it.” That is the kind of “journalism” that wins plaudits in MAGA-land.
I have yet to mention Elon Musk. Unlike the other power brokers, the world’s richest man is not keeping in the background. His embrace of, and then banishment by, Trump has left him in limbo. He fell out earlier with Farage, seeing in the Reform leader someone who is not disruptive enough.
Musk’s closest political ally in the UK is Tommy Robinson, one-time member of the British National Party and founder of the English Defence League with a string of violence-related convictions. Robinson succeeded in getting more than 100,000 people onto the streets of London on a Saturday in August for a rally called “Unite the Kingdom.”
MAGA, MEGA, MBGA
To many people it marked the moment when the extreme had become mainstream. Several parts of the capital city felt as if they had been overwhelmed by thugs, as they called for mass deportations. Charlie Kirk, the recently murdered right-wing influencer, featured on many T-shirts. MAGA, MEGA (Make England Great Again), and MBGA (Make Britain Great Again) hats were proudly worn. Among the chants was: “From the river to the sea, let’s make England Abdul-free.”
The high (or low) point, depending on your point of view, was a video address by Musk. To rapturous applause, he told the crowd: “whether you choose violence or not, violence is coming to you. You either fight back or die.” Government ministers, under strict instructions not to upset Trump or the British right, said they didn’t quite see that statement as an incitement to violence.
All this has had a huge effect on how the Labour government operates. Everything Starmer does is stress-tested through the lens of the Reform voter, particularly on immigration. The recent announcements of a crackdown—if the measures ever came into effect—would turn the UK into one of the countries most hostile to irregular migrants in the democratic world.
Labour is hemorrhaging support not just to the right but also to the progressive left. There are signs that liberal voters furious with Starmer will vote tactically, choosing between the Greens, Liberal Democrats, and the Scottish or Welsh nationalists—to keep out not only Reform and the Tories, but Labour, too. Like the right, they also look wistfully to the United States. In their case, they have been galvanized by the dramatic arrival on the scene of Zohran Mamdani, the newly inaugurated mayor of New York City.
Labour has publicly declared the Conservatives to be over and out. Next May’s regional and local elections could spell the end for not just Badenoch, but Starmer too, as his leadership is openly questioned and mocked from within his own ranks. A devastating result may force him to resign, with a number of Labour hopefuls waiting in the wings.
Which leaves Farage and Reform UK in pole position to consolidate their takeover of the UK come the next general election. For Trump that would be a pivotal moment, as he seeks to implant like-minded souls to run countries around the world. Argentina, Hungary, Italy, El Salvador, and others are, for sure, important. But one prize stands out. It’s not so much the power of Britain, but its symbolism that would bring Trump the ultimate glee.
John Kampfner is a regular contributor to The Guardian, Foreign Policy, and DIE ZEIT. His new book Braver New World. The Countries Daring to Do Things Others Won’t will be published in April.
