Boris Johnson defends 'admiring' Donald Trump as he claims PM helped reverse child detention policy
The foreign secretary suggests UK condemnation of separating undocumented children from parents led the president to backtrack.
Tuesday 26 June 2018 14:40, UK
Boris Johnson has defended his claim that he is "increasingly admiring" of Donald Trump as he reeled off a list of the US president's achievements.
A recent leaked recording revealed the foreign secretary's appreciation of Mr Trump, as well as his suggestion the US president might negotiate Brexit better than the government.
Grilled about his remarks in the House of Commons on Tuesday, Mr Johnson told MPs his comments referred to Mr Trump's "willingness, in defiance of the experts, to reach out to the leadership of North Korea and attempt to do a deal".
When Labour's shadow foreign secretary Emily Thornberry challenged Mr Johnson to list three things about his "new hero" that he "increasingly admires", the foreign secretary again highlighted Mr Trump's efforts in trying to reach a denuclearisation agreement on the Korean peninsula.
Mr Johnson also cited the US president's military response against the Syrian regime over a chemical weapons attack, as well as Mr Trump's demand for European countries to spend more on defence.
On the latter point, the foreign secretary revealed the government "shall certainly be assisting in that effort" ahead of a NATO summit next month.
Ms Thornberry declared the record of Mr Trump, who "bans Muslims and supports Nazis", should not be admired but "abhorred" as she suggested the US president should not "have the honour" of meeting the Queen on his visit to the UK next month.
Mr Johnson replied: "It is right that the UK should welcome to this country the head of state of our most important and most trusted ally."
Ms Thornberry also used the pair's exchanges at Foreign Office Questions to mock Mr Johnson's absence from the House of Commons on Monday night, when MPs voted to back expansion of Heathrow Airport.
The foreign secretary skipped the parliamentary showdown with a trip to Afghanistan on Monday, allowing him to avoid having to resign from the government in order to vote against a third runway he previously vowed to lie down in front of bulldozers to block.
Mr Johnson had earlier outlined how the "exceptionally close" friendship between the US and UK did not prevent ministers from speaking out against American policies.
He suggested Theresa May's recent condemnation of the separation of undocumented children from their parents in US migrant detention facilities had prompted Mr Trump to backtrack.
Mr Johnson told MPs: "I think that when the prime minister spoke, she spoke indeed for me and for everyone else in this House and indeed for the nation.
"No sooner had she spoken… the president signed an executive order repealing the policy."
Among those MPs to speak against Mr Trump, the SNP's Peter Grant branded the US president a "serial child abuser", telling the House of Commons: "Putting children into concentration camps is not acceptable.
"He has not yet taken them out of these camps, he's holding them hostage to force their parents to give up their claims to asylum."
Last week, Mrs May told the House of Commons that "pictures of children being held in what appear to be cages are deeply disturbing", adding: "This is wrong; this is not something that we agree with."
Mr Trump has bowed to pressure and promised to "keep families together" who are detained on suspicion of crossing the US border illegally.