Donald Trump is back in the Oval Office and he’s already calling out names, this time taking aim across the pond at the UK’s next up-and-coming political leader. During a White House meeting with NATO chief Mark Rutte, Trump got asked about Andy Burnham—the former Manchester mayor who is currently looking like the favorite to take over the UK Labour Party. Trump didn't hesitate to play him down, saying, "I don’t know, I think I see that he was, I guess, the mayor of a town."

Trump didn't stop at the personal shots. He went straight for the UK’s energy policies, saying Burnham is "extremely liberal" and predicting that the man "probably won’t open up the North Sea" for oil drilling. Trump wrapped it all up with a heavy statement, telling reporters straight up that "the UK is dying." It’s a clear warning that if Burnham takes the top spot in British politics, the relationship between Washington and London is going to be incredibly rocky.

Now, Burnham has been talking trash about Trump for a minute. Just this month, while campaigning out in Makerfield, Burnham was telling voters that American politics is "polarised" and "poisonous." He’s been on this wave for years, too. Back during the Capitol riots in 2021, Burnham hopped on X to put his own colleagues on blast, saying, "Any UK politician who gave Trump the time of day should be ashamed right now." Well, now Trump is back in charge, and he clearly remembers who was talking loud.

This whole situation shows that UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s plan to play nice with Trump was never going to last. Starmer tried to kiss up to Trump after he won the election in November 2024, and the media gave him props for handling the president. But that diplomatic peace shattered real quick when the US and Israel started a war with Iran back in February, and the UK refused to jump into the fire with them.

That brings us to why NATO’s Mark Rutte was in the Oval Office in the first place. He’s trying to keep the peace before the big July summit in Ankara, especially since Trump has been threatening to pull US troops out of Europe. Trump has been calling NATO a "paper tiger" for years, and he’s hot because countries like the UK, Italy, Germany, and Spain wouldn't back the US in the Middle East or help open up the Strait of Hormuz.

To try and calm Trump down, Rutte pulled up to the meeting with literal cardboard charts, trying to show that European allies have been paying their fair share of the bills since Trump first got elected in 2017. Rutte even pointed out that thousands of US warplanes have been taking off from European bases during this Iran war, telling Trump, "I know there have been isolated cases about which you are really disappointed, but generally speaking your European allies have been there."