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By Tina Brown
Ms. Brown is the author of “The Palace Papers” and “The Diana Chronicles.” She writes a weekly newsletter, Fresh Hell.
When President Trump made his first state visit to Britain in 2019, it was privately seen by the royal family as throwing open Buckingham Palace to a political phenomenon whom Britons viewed as a comical aberration. Back then, the 93-year-old Queen Elizabeth II presided over a glittering tiarafest that had been carefully calibrated to thrill America’s 45th president. But there was an undertone of cosplay to all the swankery, summed up in Camilla’s playful wink to a member of her security detail during a photo op at Clarence House with the Trumps. The moment went viral the next day.
This week, for Mr. Trump’s second state visit — an unprecedented honor for a U.S. president — the mood is darker. Mr. Trump is no longer the amusing soap opera president. He’s a bullying global force, unafraid of launching tariff torpedoes or, off and on, threatening to throw Eastern Europe to the wolves of Russia. And his angry populism is spreading: On Saturday tens of thousands of far-right protesters — amped up by a shocking video cameo from Elon Musk, who urged them to “fight back” — jammed the streets of central London.
