King Charles’s Washington Visit Exposes the Cracks in the ‘Special Relationship’

Key facts

• Maintenance crews initially hung the Australian flag instead of the Union Jack on White House lampposts.
• A bee landed on President Trump’s palm during the White House beehive tour with King Charles and Queen Camilla.
• Trump referred to Prime Minister Keir Starmer as Neville Chamberlain over Starmer’s lack of enthusiasm for Trump’s Iran war.
• Former U.S. Ambassador Peter Mandelson was recalled amid revelations of ties to Jeffrey Epstein.
• Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor was arrested on suspicion of passing confidential briefings to Epstein while a U.K. trade envoy.
• Christian Turner, Mandelson’s replacement, said America’s true special relationship is with ‘probably Israel.’
• Charles’s address to Congress drew standing ovations for lines about the Founding Fathers, Magna Carta, NATO, and Ukraine.
• The Senate took up Tim Kaine’s war-powers resolution to block military action in Cuba without congressional authorization.

A Royal Welcome Marred by Missteps

The planning for King Charles III’s state visit to Washington, intended to celebrate America’s semiquincentennial, began long before the 2024 presidential election was decided. Last week, maintenance crews adorned lampposts near the White House with the Union Jack—except they mistakenly hung the Australian flag. The Transportation Secretary’s office said the error was soon rectified. When the King and Queen Camilla landed on Monday, they were received by President Donald Trump and the First Lady in the West Wing for tea and a tour of the White House’s new beehives. During the tour, a bee landed on Trump’s outstretched palm, which he displayed for the royal couple and Melania. The next morning, American military units and bands marched through rain on the South Lawn for the welcome ceremony, while occasional banging from Trump’s ballroom-construction project interrupted the music. A crane hovered above, and the U.K. press pool joked that its operators had the best view.

Trump’s ‘Beautiful British Day’ and the King’s ‘Readjustment’

“What a beautiful, British day this is,” Trump said, looking out at the drizzle from a podium. “And it really is.” Attendees shouted for others to close their umbrellas so they could see. Cabinet secretaries and senior officials wiped damp seats with napkins. For his review of the troops, Trump moved at a fast clip with a marine guard, leaving Charles trailing slightly behind. Camilla and Melania sat together in white outfits, watching their husbands. Ceremonial cannonballs were fired, and thick smoke billowed through the wet air. Trump gestured to a tree that Queen Elizabeth II had given the U.S. decades ago. “It was a young and beautiful tree, and look at it now,” he said. “It’s tripled in size and tripled in strength, very much as our nations have.” Charles gently referred to the gaping hole where the East Wing once stood as Trump’s “readjustment.”

The ‘Special Relationship’ in Free Fall

The themes of “reconciliation and renewal” had been heavily teased in advance of the visit, but the “special relationship” was in free fall. “With who?” Trump said when asked about it last week. A British journalist described witnessing “the strange, ongoing U.K.-U.S. meltdown.” It wasn’t just that Britain’s most recent U.S. Ambassador, Peter Mandelson, had been recalled amid new revelations regarding his close ties to Jeffrey Epstein; there was talk that Prime Minister Keir Starmer would resign over the scandal. Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, the King’s younger brother, had been arrested under suspicion of passing confidential briefings to Epstein while serving as a U.K. trade envoy. Both Mandelson and Andrew have denied wrongdoing. Meanwhile, Starmer’s lack of enthusiasm for Trump’s war with Iran led the President to refer to him as Neville Chamberlain. Christian Turner, Mandelson’s replacement, had said that America’s true special relationship is with “probably Israel.” The remarks, made earlier this year to a group of U.K. students, were leaked the week of the visit and splashed across the front page of the Financial Times the day that Trump received Charles.

Trump’s Praise for the King and Condemnation of Starmer

In an interview with Sky News, Trump denigrated Starmer, whose policies he characterized as “insane”; his political future, he said, depended on cracking down on immigration. “They’re destroying your country.” Charles, meanwhile, was a “great gentleman.” The King is the embodiment of the England that the President still likes: Windsor Castle, glossy magazine covers of Princess Diana. As Freddie Hayward of The New Statesman put it, “Instead of sending their hapless Prime Minister, they would work with the grain of Americans’ love for our royals.” One official compared it to the King’s Speech in Parliament, where the monarch becomes the mouthpiece for the government. There is always glee in Washington in advance of royal visits. When Charles came in 1985 as a prince, the Washington Post ran a 116-page supplement from the British Tourist Authority. This time, the most sought-after invitation was for a garden tea at the British Embassy, where members of Trump’s Cabinet joined the receiving line for the King. “I wasn’t invited, so my republicanism is hardening,” a British journalist said. “The visit seems far more significant to Washington than it does to Westminster.” In D.C., he continued, “People here have switched from ‘No Kings’ to ‘O.K., one king, as long as he’s not ours.’”

Trump’s Royal Cosplay and the South Lawn Speech

Trump enjoys royal cosplay. He has posted memes of himself as a monarch; after an apparent assassination attempt at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner, he told a CBS anchor, “If I was a king, I wouldn’t be dealing with you.” Just before the welcome ceremony, Trump responded to an article in the Daily Mail suggesting he might be a distant cousin of the King’s. “Wow, that’s nice,” he wrote on Truth Social. “I’ve always wanted to live in Buckingham Palace!” The speech on the South Lawn went beyond usual pomp. “For nearly two centuries before the Revolution, this land was settled and forged by men, women, who bore in their souls the blood and noble spirit of the British,” Trump said. “Their veins ran with Anglo-Saxon courage, their hearts beat with an English faith.” This heritage, he said, was the foundation of liberty. “In recent years, we’ve often heard it said that America is merely an idea. But the cause of freedom did not simply appear as an intellectual invention of 1776.” A senior Administration official said that “republican ideas and Anglo-Saxon heritage are inextricable.” Another reporter said Steve Bannon had sent him a text after the speech: “blood and soil—epic.”

Charles’s Address to Congress: Unity Amid Partisan Divide

A few hours later, the King travelled to the Capitol to give a joint address to Congress. As Charles and House Speaker Mike Johnson took a ceremonial walk through Statuary Hall, news broke that the Justice Department was again indicting former F.B.I. director James Comey, this time for an Instagram post in which he arranged seashells in a manner that allegedly threatened the President’s life. Watching the House chamber from the viewing gallery was like peering into a garden party from above. One man was dressed as George Washington. Nearly all members stood to cheer for Charles’s lines about the Founding Fathers—“bold and imaginative rebels with a cause”—and the Magna Carta, which decreed that “the executive branch be subject to checks and balances.” He spoke of shared values, and in support of Ukraine, NATO, and environmental preservation; most of the chamber applauded. There were exceptions: Representative Lauren Boebert threw her hands up in annoyance at the mention of Ukraine. A Democratic congressman texted, “He spoke of our values and our common history and all those good things. I wish Trump could think the same way.” A political editor at a British outlet was more cynical, saying Charles had used “woke diversity language in order to win over ‘No Kings’ Democrats.”

Reconciliation Rhetoric vs. Political Reality

At the White House state dinner, Trump noted of Charles’s speech, “He got the Democrats to stand. I’ve never been able to do that.” Charles toasted Trump’s ballroom. “I am sorry to say that we British, of course, made our own attempt at real-estate redevelopment of the White House in 1814,” he said, referring to when they set it on fire. “The story of Britain and America,” he said, “is one of reconciliation.” Yet the contrast between Trump’s heritage-focused address and Charles’s values-based speech could not have been starker. A British host at a “red coats and rosé” party said Trump’s speech made people “well up with national pride.” Meanwhile, the Senate reconvened to take up Tim Kaine’s war-powers resolution to block the President from taking military action in Cuba without congressional authorization. The House was poised to vote on bills on warrantless surveillance and funding the Department of Homeland Security, which has been shut down since mid-February. The visit papered over deep fractures, but the underlying tensions remain unresolved.

The bottom line

• The royal visit highlighted the strained U.S.-U.K. relationship, with Trump openly criticizing Starmer and praising Charles.
• Diplomatic missteps, including a flag error and leaks about the ambassador’s remarks, underscored the lack of coordination.
• Trump’s South Lawn speech emphasized Anglo-Saxon heritage, drawing praise from right-wing figures like Steve Bannon.
• Charles’s address to Congress focused on shared values, NATO, and Ukraine, earning bipartisan applause but not universal support.
• The visit occurred amid political crises in the U.K., including the recall of Ambassador Mandelson and the arrest of the King’s brother.
• Despite the rhetoric of reconciliation, substantive disagreements on Iran, immigration, and domestic policy remain.