The recent British Prime Minister has the prospect to realign relations with the White House – but plenty of sensitive issues and the US elections make this difficult

The recent British Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, has only a couple of days to settle into office before he faces his first test on the world stage.

After winning a landslide victory for his party on July 4, 2024, Starmer will travel to Washington, DC, to Decisive NATO summit from 9 July. A couple of days later, he’ll receive over 50 European heads of state and government for Meeting of the European Political Community.

Faced with many global challenges, Starmer has the chance to indicate that Britain is back on the world stage. Especially with many Western heads of state and government are facing considerable headwinds in their very own country – think Emmanuel Macron in France or Olaf Scholz in Germany – Starmer has the prospect to revive Britain because the US’s most significant partner in Europe.

The partnership with the USA is a Priority for the brand new British governmentThe so-called “special relationship” has been strained lately, especially because of Brexit – the British decision to depart the European Union – which reduced British influence in Europe and jeopardised the peace agreement in Northern Ireland. The latter point was particularly galling for President Joe Bidenwho’s of Irish descent.

But translating Britain's desire for greater engagement into influence over US policy might be an actual challenge for Starmer. To succeed, he could have to navigate plenty of thorny issues, including US electoral politics, the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, the perceived threat from China and a brand new start with the EU. In all of those cases, overcoming existing differences between London and Washington won’t be easy.

Waiting for the subsequent elections

As Starmer begins to construct relationships with Washington, it’s an inescapable fact for him that he doesn’t know who he might be coping with for many of his time in office.

For the primary time since 1992The British general elections took place just a couple of months before the presidential elections on the opposite side of the Atlantic.

This could lead on to significant investment in transatlantic relations coming to a halt until American voters determine in November.

On the surface, Starmer's left-leaning Labour Party might welcome a Democratic victory in November. Aside from not having to cope with a change of president, the 2 parties are philosophically closer, and Starmer has expressed his admiration for the presumptive Democratic candidate President Joe Biden.

David Lammy, the British government’s prospective foreign minister, has also has openly denigrated Republican Donald Trump prior to nowand called him a “misogynistic, neo-Nazi-sympathizing sociopath” and a “serious threat to the international order.”

But the vitality of the connection between prime minister and president often trusted more on personalities than on mere ideological affinityWhile Labour's Tony Blair and Conservative George W. Bush worked well together, this was hardly the case with Donald Trump and Theresa May – each of whom led the established right-wing parties of their countries.

It stays to be seen how Starmer will fare among the many presumptive US presidential candidates. But he’ll finally get the prospect to check Biden on the NATO summit after no meeting with the President took place while he was leader of the British opposition. Lammy, for his part, was steadily Maintaining relations with the MAGA sphere within the event of a Trump victory.

Ukraine and defence

Beyond the personalities, the fate of the “special relationship” may even rely on whether each side manage to succeed in an agreement on some sensitive issues.

Since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022, the UK has been on the forefront of supporting Ukraine. Provision of contemporary weapons and training of Ukrainian pilotsThe British government also signed a Security pact with Kyiv in JanuaryStarmer shouldn’t be expected to deviate from this line.

But this commitment is unlikely to influence the United States on some crucial issues within the war. Although Britain is actively pushing for Ukraine to hitch NATO, the Biden administration shouldn’t be prepared to present in on this issue presentlyAnd if Trump wins in November, defense spending could once more turn out to be a bone of contention. NATO allies are pushing for defense spending to be raised to 2.5% of gross domestic product – but Labour would need to balance this goal with competing domestic priorities These include improving the highly valued National Health Service and tackling the associated fee of living crisis.

Gaza tightrope walk

A maybe even more sensitive issue that the brand new prime minister must negotiate together with his counterpart within the White House is the Gaza query.

After taking office as party leader in 2020, Starmer worked tirelessly to proceed the legacy of his predecessor, extreme left and really pro-Palestinian This also included making every effort to reverse the general public perception of the Labour Party as anti-Semitic.

But Starmer's more pro-Israel stance following the October 7 attacks has alienated a few of Labour's traditional voters.

And the about-face doesn’t mean that Labour's position on Gaza shouldn’t be sometimes at odds with that of the White House. In particular, neither Starmer nor Lammy have condemned the International Criminal Court's hope of obtaining an arrest warrant for the leaders of Israel and Hamas. Biden, for his part, called this move by the ICC “outrageous.”

Pressure on China

China might be one other very delicate test of the brand new British government's friendship with Washington. Lammy has promised that Labour will initiate a comprehensive review of the country's policies with China to find out “where we need to compete, where we can cooperate and where we need to challenge.”

Such a review could help overcome the inner divisions throughout the Labour Party between supporters of higher relations with Beijing and those that consider it a security threat.

But the test could turn out to be much more vital given the likely pressure Britain will face from Washington, where members of each parties strongly support geopolitical competition with Beijing. Britain and the US there are already differences of opinion in the case of China, resembling the over-acceptance of Chinese production of electrical vehicles or the query of whether Beijing committed genocide in Xinjiang.

Finally, as a foreign policy analyst Sophia Gaston expressed it“The big question for Labour is whether it believes strategic competition is purely a US-China issue, or whether Britain can play a role in it.”

Reorientation of EU relations

Ultimately, the strength of the special relationship may even rely on how well Labour manages to its planned restart with the EU.

Building closer ties with European partners could strengthen Britain’s influence and function a hedging strategy within the event that Trump wins the election and leads the US in a more isolationist direction.

But Labour shouldn’t robotically assume that it can find willing partners in Europe. The scars of the Brexit negotiations, the rise of the intense right in Europe and the most important crises in Ukraine and the Middle East could limit the European bandwidth to make great efforts to construct relations with the brand new Labour government.

Starmer and his government could have a chance to revive the special relationship with the US – however the road to doing so is prone to be anything but smooth. American electoral politics and misalignment on plenty of thorny challenges could easily throw the brand new prime minister astray. In addition, the delicate state of the British economy severely restrict the brand new government’s scope for foreign policy motionIt also implies that Starmer is prone to focus, not less than initially, on problems at home moderately than abroad.