From our UK edition
Mind your manors US Vice-President J.D. Vance is holidaying in an £8,000-a-week manor house near Charlbury in the Cotswolds. What are the other options available on Airbnb or Booking.com for staying in the area for this week (seven nights)?
What people on the other side of the pond call "Brand Britain" has taken something of a knock in recent years – especially in the United States, which the British often still view as an errant son. With unnerving speed Britain's reputation has collapsed stateside, especially among the political right, from the country of Brideshead Revisited to a grotty Airstrip One. The symbol of the new Britain in the eyes of many Americans are the ubiquitous licenses (or, in the argot of a London copper, "loicenses") that citizens seem to need for everything – including, most notoriously, owning a TV. Now even the Foreign Secretary has been caught without a loicense. On Friday David Lammy went fishing with the now-Vice President J.D.
Vice President Vance is currently receiving visitors at an 18th-century Georgian manor in the Cotswolds, an implausibly quaint patch of the English countryside. Petitioners so far have included James Orr, the Cambridge academic and right-wing activist, Robert Jenrick, likely the next leader of Britain's Tories, and Nigel Farage, likely the next UK Prime Minister. Also on the list was one Thomas Skinner, a gregarious wide boy from East London turned e-celebrity turned patriotic influencer. After a stint as a pillow and mattress merchant Skinner, 34, found fame as a contestant on the 15th series of the British version of The Apprentice.
In this week’s South Park, the second episode since Paramount paid Trey Parker and Matt Stone eleventy billion dollars to make content, Parker and Stone absolutely and brilliantly rip the Trump administration to shreds. Unlike our late-night comedy hosts, who don’t have the chops for anything other than name-calling and juvenile slap fights with the President, South Park gets to the heart of darkness of the Trump administration, and also to what’s so funny about our new political age. Not only does the episode feature a savage attack on Trump, depicting him as Mr. Roarke at Mar-a-Lago as Fantasy Island, it also shows J.D. Vance as a tiny Tattoo, who Trump literally kicks out of the way when he gets annoying.
From our UK edition
16 min listen
Nigel Farage hosted a press conference today as part of Reform's summer crime campaign 'Britain is lawless'. He unveiled the latest Tory defector: Leicestershire's Police & Crime Commissioner Rupert Matthews. Amidst all the noise of whether crime in the UK is falling or not, plus the impact of migration on crime, is Reform's messaging cutting through? Would US Vice President agree with Farage's message that Britain is lawless? Vance is in the UK, staying in the Cotswolds, as part of his summer holiday. Tim Shipman and Lucy Dunn are joined by James Orr, associate professor at Cambridge University, and a friend of Vance's to talk us through the dynamics between Trump, Vance, Starmer, Lammy and Farage. Does Farage have Vance's ear?
Where does a good America First hillbilly like to spend his summer? Cockburn would not have thought the answer was the Cotswolds — that glossy patch of the English countryside where limey aristos and media darlings drink overpriced rose with plutocratic American slebs. And yet your correspondent hears from almost impeccable sources that Vice President J.D. Vance and his wife Usha are looking for properties to rent in the area. Vance is supposedly making enquiries for a country pad, possibly ahead of Trump's state visit to the UK. One Oxfordshire property was unable to help because it is playing host to a literary festival at around the same time. But another filthy rich Anglo is said to be considering offering his own home to the Second Family.
Washington, DC “Every other country celebrates their victories, it’s about time America did too,” Donald Trump told a whooping, albeit smaller-than-anticipated crowd on the National Mall tonight. “We’re the hottest country in the world right now,” the President boasted. Temperature-wise, that’s debatable. But he’s right that the whole world has been watching on, as the President turned his plans for a military parade from conception into reality. If you gave a 79-year-old man some say in what he did for his birthday, he’d choose one of two things: nap, or pay a laudatory tribute to the US military that everyone had to watch.
Washington, DC Usha Vance is on a mission. This year's low reading scores have shocked the White House into action – so they have placed the Yale-educated Second Lady at the helm of the reading recovery ship. But as well as addressing faltering childhood literacy, Vance has a host of other tasks to complete for the Trump administration. Vance described her role in Trump 2.0 at the annual US-India Strategic Partnership Forum hosted at the Waldorf Astoria in DC Tuesday. It includes reading challenges, the Special Olympics and US-India relations – fueled by her children's interactions with the country's Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The conference followed the launch of the "Second Lady Summer Reading Challenge.
“It’s been quite a while since I’ve been to a conference with this level of energy… I promise I’m not just saying that to juice my own memecoins.” After dropping this clanger in his keynote speech at the 2025 Bitcoin Conference, J.D. Vance paused awkwardly for an applause which never arrived. Bar a few perfunctory laughs, this was one buzzword the Vice President rolled out which failed to impress the thousands-strong crowd in Vegas yesterday afternoon. To understand the frosty reception, a cursory glance through Trump’s recent dealings in this chaotic corner of the crypto industry is required. On January 17 this year – a mere three days before his inauguration – the soon-to-be president of the United States launched his own memecoin: $TRUMP.
It was an emollient J.D. Vance who showed up at the Munich Leaders Meeting in Washington, DC. Gone was the Vance who dissed the Europeans in Munich on February 15 by complaining that they were practicing censorship of political views and who met with a representative of the far-right Alternative für Deutschland party. Gone was the Cerberus who barked at Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on the Oval Office on February 24 that he had exhibited a dismaying lack of gratitude toward America for its assistance to his beleaguered nation. Gone was the Ohio senator who declared in July 2024 that he didn’t give a fig about Ukraine’s fate and was more interested in pursuing an Asia First policy.
Is Donald Trump forsaking four more years? In an interview today with NBC’s Kristen Welker, Trump indicated that while his MAGA faithful may be hawking hats in support of a 2028 run, he’s not keen on the idea. “I’ll be an eight-year president,” he said. “I’ll be a two-term president. I always thought that was very important.” His current term, he added, was more than adequate to accomplish something “really spectacular.” The interest that Trump’s declaration of non-intention is receiving offers a reminder that he stirs up as much news with what he doesn’t do as with what he does. The only president to smash the barrier was, of course, Franklin D.
One hundred days into the second Donald Trump presidency, his presence in the Oval Office represents the largest sea change in US foreign relations since the end of the Cold War. Within the space of fewer than four months, Trump has forced Ukraine to deal with reality, by delivering hard truths about what ending the war will require. He has deployed J.D. Vance to shock the international system, with tough messages to our allies in Europe and Asia. Trump’s declaration of a litany of cartels as foreign terror organizations has kicked off a redirection of our relationship with Mexico, Panama and the Western hemisphere. His close relationship with Israel, a clear break with Joe Biden’s approach, has shifted expectations for the Middle East.
J.D. Vance told UnHerd yesterday that the United States has a “much more reciprocal relationship” with the UK than it does with countries such as Germany. This is a highly selective assertion. What is more accurate to say is that the US has taken over and squeezed the UK economy. American politicians never allude to the vast number of American enterprises with large, high-margin UK operations steadily extracting profits. Such firms include Starbucks of Seattle, Costa Coffee (owned by Coca-Cola of Atlanta, Georgia) and Boots the Chemist (owned by Walgreens Boots Alliance of Illinois).
From our UK edition
13 min listen
As Donald Trump’s policies on tariffs keep shifting, leaving countries scrambling to react, there has been some good news for Keir Starmer and the Labour government. Speaking to UnHerd, the US vice-president J.D. Vance spoke up the UK’s chances of securing a trade deal. While this would be a win for Starmer, questions remain over the substance – from agriculture to food, what would be included? And can we really believe it will happen? The Spectator’s political editor Katy Balls and deputy US editor Kate Andrews join Patrick Gibbons to discuss. Produced by Patrick Gibbons.
Former governor uses AI to co-author housing plan If you were worried about disgraced former governor Andrew Cuomo being too “hands-on” during his run for New York mayor, fear not: the Love Gov’s campaign has an impersonal touch to it. Local news site Hell Gate exposed how the 29-page housing plan released by the Cuomo campaign bore the hallmarks of being partially put together using ChatGPT. One particularly unparsable passage: Nevertheless, several candidates for mayor this year have either called directly for a rent increase or for other measures that would tilt the scale toward lower rent increases. This is a politically convenient posture, but to be in. Victory if landlords — small landlords in particular — are simply unable to maintain their buildings.
“So Charlie Kirk tweeted about it and Don Jr. shared it, so I think I’m OK,” one presidential nominee told me earlier this year. The important thing, as they say in the City of Brotherly Love, is the implication. The implication here being that he was among the chosen ones, counted upon, trusted, a five-star A-list recruit. Of course Matt Gaetz, the former Florida congressman, also had the backing of the President’s eldest son and Kirk, who founded Turning Point USA. Kirk spent a day urging a potential alternative for the role of Trump’s attorney general to take the job, only to follow up with: “Can we count on you for Matt?” But Gaetz wasn’t able to cross the line. He is now a host on One America News.
Vice President J.D. Vance’s speech condemning Europe’s abandonment of basic western values was a seminal moment in US-European relations. It provoked immediate praise from American conservatives and disparagement from European leaders, including German Chancellor Olaf Scholz. Critics and admirers both recognized the significance of Vance’s message. The February 14 speech, which Mr. Vance gave on his first trip abroad as vice president, yielded millions of views on X and spawned dozens of op-eds in response. At the Munich Security Conference – typically a venue to discuss defense spending and the like – Mr Vance told the entire European leadership class that they themselves are the biggest threat to European security.
What with all the Rose Garden theatrics of “Liberation Day” and Donald Trump’s wild decision to tariff most of Planet Earth at once, Politico’s big “Musk will leave” scoop quickly sank down the news agenda. That’s partly because it wasn’t really a scoop at all. Elon Musk has said repeatedly that his role in the White House is only temporary. His status as a “special government employee,” which exempts him from some ethics and conflict-of-interest rules, is only meant to last 130 days and so his contract, such as it is, is likely to expire in late May or early June. Musk confirmed to Fox News last week that he was not in government for the long term while President Trump told reporters on Monday: “I think he’s amazing, but he’s got a big company to run...
A dramatic escalation has happened in the information war between the US and Europe. Ofcom, the British media regulator that fancies itself as a global censor, has made a move. Ofcom sent a formal demand to Gab – an American social media platform with no legal presence in Britain – threatening it with ruinous fines unless it complied with the UK’s Online Safety Act. Gab’s reply to Ofcom was not polite. It was cold, clinical and lethal. Through its lawyers, Gab told Ofcom – with legal precision and unmistakable clarity – to get lost. This isn’t some polite regulatory disagreement.
Most people use groupchats to share memes, organize brunch or gossip. The Trump administration plans air strikes. After Atlantic editor-in-chief Jeffrey Goldberg was inadvertently included in the "Houthi PC small group" Signal chat by National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, administration officials were eager to stress that no classified information was included in the unofficial chat. As a result, Goldberg published screenshots of the full conversation this morning. The messages offer a glimpse into not just the views of various cabinet members on foreign affairs; they reveal the texting styles of some of the most consequential government officials in the world. Some are relatable. "Having read thru the full Houthi PC small group logs, I've come to the sad realization that I'm the J.D.
