King Charles III quoted Oscar Wilde, joking that the British have everything in common with America \u201cexcept, of course, language.\u201d President Trump said the morning\u2019s gloomy rain reminded him of a \u201cbeautiful British day\u201d and noted that his mother thought young Prince Charles was \u201cso cute.\u201d Both men waxed poetic about the bonds between their countries.<\/p>\n
And yet, on the first full day of a state visit focused on the shared history between the United States and Britain, the king sprinkled in some ever-so-subtle rebuttals to Mr. Trump. Charles spoke on Tuesday of the value of the trans-Atlantic alliance, the importance of checks and balances and his passion for the environment. He even spoke of his time in the Royal Navy, after Mr. Trump belittled British naval capabilities in recent weeks.<\/p>\n
The king tucked his rejoinders into a mostly lighthearted speech to Congress, which drew both applause and laughter from the audience of Democrats and Republicans. It was only the second time a British monarch had addressed Congress.<\/p>\n
\u201cPlease rest assured I am not here as part of some cunning rear-guard action!\u201d the king said.<\/p>\n
The disciplined and careful public appearances by both Charles and Mr. Trump came at a dire moment in American-British relations, arguably at their lowest point in decades over the war in Iran and Mr. Trump\u2019s scathing attacks on NATO.<\/p>\n
But for a day (and maybe just a day), the special relationship that has developed over the past 250 years seemed \u2014 on the surface at least \u2014 special.<\/p>\n
In a rarity for the Trump era, the president did not veer wildly off script during the day\u2019s mostly ceremonial events. He did not invite a horde of reporters into the Oval Office just before their meeting to field questions on Iran, the ballroom or Greenland in the presence of his visiting foreign dignitary. He did not lash out at another global ally.<\/p>\n
Instead, Mr. Trump lavished the king with praise.<\/p>\n
\u201cBefore we ever proclaimed our independence, Americans carried within us the rarest of gifts \u2014 moral courage \u2014 and it came from a small but mighty kingdom from across the sea,\u201d Mr. Trump said on Tuesday morning as he welcomed Charles to the White House.<\/p>\n
There is little evidence in more recent history that an era of good feeling will last much beyond the departure of the royal couple\u2019s jet from American shores on Thursday, particularly as Mr. Trump\u2019s well-known affection for the royals does not extend to the British government.<\/p>\n
Mr. Trump is furious at Britain for its refusal to join the fight against Iran, and his administration continues to accuse the British government of denying free speech to conservative voices. In London, Prime Minister Keir Starmer vows not to be dragged into another war of America\u2019s choosing, and bristles at the president\u2019s description of their aircraft carriers as nothing more than \u201ctoys.\u201d<\/p>\n
Those differences were never likely to be erased by the king\u2019s first visit to the United States as the British monarch. By law and tradition, the king is supposed to rise above the daily back-and-forth of politics and the disputes that often bedevil the leaders of both governments.<\/p>\n
Mr. Trump was a guest of the royal family for a state dinner at Windsor Castle last September, an experience he described as \u201cone of the highest honors of my life.\u201d Months later, he belittled Mr. Starmer as a coward for not entering the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was not very long ago and look where we are in terms of the bilateral relationship,\u201d said Philippe Dickinson, deputy director at the Atlantic Council\u2019s Transatlantic Security Initiative. \u201cIt can be cited as evidence by those who are going to make the case that it\u2019s nice words one day and then forgotten the next day.\u201d<\/p>\n
The king at one point did appear to address, obliquely, the Jeffrey Epstein scandal that has caused political headaches for the Trump administration and caused a rupture in the royal family.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn both of our countries, it is the very fact of our vibrant, diverse and free societies that gives us our collective strength, including to support victims of some of the ills that, so tragically, exist in both our societies today,\u201d Charles said.<\/p>\n
Mr. Trump welcomed the king to the White House with a ceremony known as reviewing the troops, the highest diplomatic honor that can be extended by the United States to a visiting head of state, as well as the 21-gun salute by an honor guard.<\/p>\n
In a speech that largely stuck to his prepared remarks, Mr. Trump praised the Anglo-American relationship in lofty terms, describing it as having birthed a \u201crevolution in human freedom\u201d that was \u201cnever, ever extinguished, but carried forward across centuries, across oceans and across history, until it became a fire that lit the entire world.\u201d<\/p>\n
And while Charles did not directly reference tensions between Britain and the United States \u2014 and no part of the king or president\u2019s day of conversations were made public \u2014 he at times appeared to be in conversation with Mr. Trump and other doubters of the Western alliance during his speech to Congress.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe very principle on which your Congress was founded \u2014 no taxation without representation \u2014 was at once a fundamental disagreement between us, and at the same time a shared democratic value which you inherited from us,\u201d the king said during his speech to Congress on Tuesday afternoon. \u201cOurs is a partnership born out of dispute.\u201d<\/p>\n
He drew a standing ovation when he spoke about how the concept of checks and balances in American government has its roots in English history. Charles said the U.S. Supreme Court Historical Society found that Magna Carta was cited in at least 160 Supreme Court cases since 1789, \u201cnot least as the foundation of the principle that executive power is subject to checks and balances.\u201d Mr. Trump has worked to significantly expand executive power.<\/p>\n
He spoke of \u201cthe natural wonders\u201d of the United States and \u201cour shared responsibility to safeguard nature, our most precious and irreplaceable asset.\u201d Charles is an avid environmentalist; Mr. Trump, by contrast, pulled out of the Paris agreement on climate change, making the United States the only country in the world to abandon the international commitment to slow global warming.<\/p>\n
Charles also seemed to take note that Mr. Trump has repeatedly belittled Mr. Starmer<\/a> as a coward and mocked British military might.<\/p>\n The king spoke of his own service in the Royal Navy more than a half-century ago and repeated Mr. Starmer\u2019s assertion that Britain had \u201ccommitted to the biggest sustained increase in defense spending since the Cold War.\u201d<\/p>\n