Does MAGA prefer Jenrick?

Coffee House Shots

The Spectator

News, Politics, Government, Daily News

4.4 • 2.1K Ratings

🗓️ 13 August 2025

⏱️ 11 minutes

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Summary

JD Vance has been in the Cotswolds this week on his Britain fantasy tour. This has been billed as a ‘holiday’ but he did take the time out of his busy schedule to meet with some of Britain’s right-wing politicians. Robert Jenrick, Chris Philp and Nigel Farage were all granted an audience with the vice-president, and even Danny Kruger and pillow salesman/Apprentice star Thomas Skinner got the call-up. The notable exclusion is, of course, Kemi Badenoch, who despite claiming to be firm friends with Vance was NFI’d. CCHQ claim this is due to scheduling, but clearly it’s an embarrassing snub. So who is MAGA’s favourite UK politician? And do the American right even care about what’s going on in Britain?

James Heale speaks to Tim Shipman and Freddy Gray.

Produced by Oscar Edmondson.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello and welcome to Coffee House Shots. I'm James Hill and I'm joined today by Tim Shipman and Freddie Gray.
0:09.4	Now, this afternoon is going to be a call between the American president, vice president and European leaders concerning the upcoming Alaska summit.
0:15.7	But before all that, we've had a whole succession of various centre-right politicians in the UK proclaiming I am Spartacus standing up and declaring their meeting, J.D. Vance, who they included Robert Jenrick, Chris Philip, Nigel Farage.
0:28.0	Tim, talks about all this excitement about everyone queuing up to declare their meeting with the Vice President and why that's important.
0:34.0	Well, look, he's the biggest name in town. He is someone who a great number of the British
0:39.3	political class have been courting for some time. David Lammy, the foreign secretary, when he
0:43.8	worked out that Trump was probably going to win, when the election was straight over there,
0:47.8	like a rat up a drain pipe trying to get to know J.D. Vanson. They went fishing earlier in the
0:53.4	week at Chevening.
0:55.4	They were told Lammie is now in hot water and has referred himself to the Commissioner for
1:00.3	Standards having not had the correct fishing licence at the time. If that weren't bad enough,
1:05.2	Vance then revealed that his own children had caught more fish than Lammie had.
1:09.7	So that in the light of the licence issue
1:14.0	may turn out to be a good thing for the Foreign Secretary. But look, this is, you know,
1:18.2	anyone who has followed sort of British politics and American politics for last 20 years
1:22.6	knows that British politicians go gooey, weak at the knees at the prospect of hanging out with their US
1:28.9	counterparts. They've all watched the West Wing. It's impossibly exciting and dramatic for them.
1:33.9	But also there's a serious point here, which is that this is a US administration that is doing
1:38.6	a lot of stuff that is up to its neck in big issues from Ukraine to tariffs to China to the Middle East.
1:45.9	And getting in the ear of these people is tremendously important,
1:49.1	which makes it all the more embarrassing that the leader of Her Majesty's official opposition,
1:52.9	Kemi Badenock, has not been able to go and join the roll call of people you named earlier.
	...

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