Up next in 10
Simon Marks joins Matt Frei head of the King's state visit to see Donald Trump next week. They discuss his claim that Prince Harry “is not speaking for the UK” after he told the US to honour its obligations in the Ukrainian conflict - and that Trump 'speaks for the UK more than Harry'. Also, the White House unveils plans for an 'Arc de Trump' - the US president's 250ft monument which will be built to tower over Washington DC as the 250th anniversary of the country's independence approaches. This is taking place while Trump has ordered a resurfacing of the Lincoln Memorial reflecting pool, and the ballroom renovations continue. Simon Marks says this is 'astonishing', given everything else happening in the world. Listen to the full show on the all-new LBC App: https://app.af.lbc.co.uk/btnc/thenewlbcapp #mattfrei #simonmarks #donaldtrump #iran #whitehouse #uspolitics #usnews #america250 LBC is the home of live debate around news and current affairs in the UK. Join in the conversation and listen at https://www.lbc.co.uk/ Sign up to LBC’s weekly newsletter here: https://l-bc.co/signup
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0:01
Well, I have two words for you. One is Simon and the other one is Marx
0:04
And there he is sitting in front of the White House. What we can't see is the building site of the big, beautiful ballroom
0:10
that is in a state of not being built, which would have been used for the state banquet, would it not, Simon, for the King's visit
0:20
Absolutely, Matt. And he was talking about that, of course, in the Oval Office on Thursday
0:26
when he was asked a question about some comments that Prince Harry had made
0:30
urging President Trump to get more involved in trying to bring peace to Ukraine
0:35
And he immediately went off on a riff about how it's such a shame that the ballroom isn't complete
0:41
because they don't have enough seats for the state banquet. But for 150 years, successive presidents have wanted this ballroom
0:50
which, of course, is complete fiction, absolutely made up. But, you know, I was on the roof earlier in the week, and it's not now just the east wing of the White House, which, of course, has been demolished and is being redeveloped as the ballroom that is under construction
1:06
In Lafayette Park, which, as you know, of course, is the park right in front of the White House
1:11
Lafayette Park is basically at this point almost entirely closed and construction is underway of the huge arena where temporary arena where President Trump on in time for the July the 4th, 250th birthday commemorations, which of course is the whole purpose of the king's visit next week to kick off that commemoration
1:35
President Trump is building a massive temporary arena because he's going to be hosting a universal fighting championship set of bouts directly in front of the White House
1:49
His view on the best way to commemorate 250 years of American independence is to do so not only with the traditional red coats that we'll see on hand when the king arrives here with their flutes and their piccolos and the drummers all done up in their traditional garb
2:10
he thinks that what the country really needs is for the Universal Fighting Championship
2:15
to be holding a series of bouts directly in front of the White House, as it will be doing in July
2:21
So there is so much construction taking place around the White House
2:26
that it's very difficult now for visitors actually to see very much of the building at times
2:33
And when you look at it from above all you see are diggers and cranes and the noises of construction that really underscore the physical changes to the skyline in this city that President Trump is determined to bring about And I love the fact that he bringing the Coliseum to Washington finally you know
2:51
the end of days, end of Rome. What about the reflector pool? This is the pool in front of
2:56
the Lincoln Memorial between that memorial and the Washington Memorial, the big cenotaph
3:00
the needle that sticks above the skyline of Washington. He wants to change that as well
3:05
Tell us about that. Yeah, well, he is refurbishing the reflecting pool
3:11
I mean, he has been over the past week, given everything that's taking place in the world, right
3:15
The future of Iran at stake, issues within his own administration here in the United States
3:21
his plunging approval ratings, the need of Republican lawmakers up on Capitol Hill
3:26
urgently for the president to focus on getting the price of petrol reduced at the pumps
3:32
or else their goose will be cooked in November's midterm elections. Given all of that, the amount of time that he spent this week
3:41
talking about refurbishment in detail, sounding as ever far more like the real estate magnate
3:49
the property and construction developer that he really is, rather, of course, than the politician that he really isn't very good at being
3:58
was astonishing. So one of these projects is the refurbishment of the Reflecting Pool, a huge landmark here in the city
4:07
It sits at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial. The president was at pains to say that it was around the Reflecting Pool that a million people gathered for Martin Luther King's famous
4:17
I Have a Dream speech, but then he immediately went on to say that he had attracted more people than that around the Reflecting Pool
4:25
I think he was suggesting during his inauguration, so we were back to crowd size again
4:31
they're actually... I mean, it's fair to say that the reflecting pool probably was in need of a bit of a clean-up
4:37
but what he's doing is bringing construction folks in to replace its floor with a blue bottom
4:46
so that it's going to look a little bit like a swimming pool. I mean, that's how he described it
4:51
Again, all of this being done without necessarily any of the permissions that previous presidents would previously have sought
5:00
And that's before we get to the massive triumphal arch that, of course, he wants to build here in Washington
5:07
replete with gold chariots and lions on the top and an inscription that reads
5:13
One Nation Under God, that is forever going to change the skyline here
5:18
So he is determined to get all of this stuff done. One of the issues this week that we learned about was the firing of the Navy Secretary And we thought that might be all about disagreements to do with policy and the way in which the Iran war was being conducted
5:33
But no, it was about the pace at which, the slow pace at which the President accused the
5:38
Navy Secretary of commissioning a new class of battleships that Donald Trump wants to
5:43
name after himself. This is where his mind currently is. Wow. We'll give you a break by just listening to this clip of Trump on the reflecting pool
5:55
Let's listen to this. And they just started today putting down the material
5:59
It's a machine. It lays it very evenly, beautiful. It goes from one side to the other. It'll take about three days
6:05
And you can end up with a beautiful, beautiful reflecting pool the way it's supposed to be
6:11
The way it's supposed to be. I mean, it does make you laugh, doesn't it? He is genuinely more interested in all this, in the building stuff
6:16
and the triumphal arch. I mean, so the people who support Trump
6:21
but maybe don't share his taste in interior design or exterior design
6:26
do they kind of think this has gone too far? He's behaving too much like the kind of monarch
6:31
whose departure we are going to celebrate on the 4th of July, 250 years later
6:37
Well, I mean, we're going to find out and we're going to find out partly in November at the midterm elections
6:42
I mean, the gap between a president who spent huge amounts of time
6:46
focused on the gilding needed, allegedly, for the Oval Office, turning it into sort of faux Versailles
6:54
Talking this week about the reflecting pool, I mean, there was also a long exposition about the changes
7:00
that he's making to the colonnade, you know, that corridor down which the president leads foreign leaders
7:07
It's just outside. Next to the Rose Garden. The Oval Office. He's replacing the stonework there with granite
7:13
and we got into the detail so much that we actually learned that the granite was from Italy but had
7:21
been finished in Africa before being sent to the United States. I mean really detailed focused stuff
7:29
about what this was going to look like. Part of it polished, part of it sanded so that presidents
7:35
wouldn't slip. He's keeping the ramp that FDR needed. He was at Payne's point out FDR needed a
7:42
ramp because of his wheelchair but out of deference to the memory of FDR he was going to keep the ramp
7:48
this sort of focus on the detail of that stuff versus the fact that when I go and fill the car
7:56
today it's going to cost me north of four dollars a gallon and he blithely dismisses the concerns
8:03
that Americans all over the country many of them far less uh capable of filling their cars at that than I might be He dismisses those concerns and says well the price price will drop as soon as the war over even at a time when his own
8:21
Defence Department officials in classified briefings on Capitol Hill are telling lawmakers
8:27
that even if you manage to sign a peace deal tomorrow, which you won't, it's going to take
8:32
six months before you can be sure that the Strait of Hormuz is cleared of mines. So therefore
8:39
the petrol price isn't going immediately to return to the level that it was at before this war began
8:45
So his lack of concern for the concerns of everyday voters, while he focuses on all this
8:54
you know, gilded stuff in Washington, DC, is a real opportunity for Democrats to exploit
9:00
coupled, of course, with the millions and millions of dollars that he, his family members and his friends
9:08
have all made as a direct result of his presidency. And we're beginning to hear several Democrats
9:15
hammering away at that as they get out onto the campaign trail ahead of November
9:19
I was going to mention that corruption. I've just been to Hungary, as you know, and it was personal corruption for Orbán and his family
9:26
and his cronies that helped to defeat him resoundingly at the polls
9:31
How much of an Achilles heel is corruption for Trump and his family
9:35
especially amongst Republicans? We know Democrats are going on about this, but what about Republicans
9:41
Well, I mean, if Democrats can get their act together, they can make hay with it. But, I mean, look, I think you do have to ask yourself
9:46
why are people like former Fox News presenter, right-wing podcaster Tucker Carlson
9:54
disengaging with Trump? Why are they cutting ties to him? And it is, I think, partly, not only, I mean, in the case of Mr. Carlson, it's Carlson
10:05
It's also driven by fury over Iran and a belief that he's completely sold out to Israel and to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
10:13
And there's a whole backstory to that with Tucker Carlson. But partly these influencers are making the point that Donald Trump has simply betrayed his working class, make America great again base
10:25
and there will be more criticism coming from people like former congresswoman Marjorie Taylor
10:31
Green positioning herself as the authentic leader of MAGA and arguing that Donald Trump has simply
10:38
betrayed all of the principles that he espoused when he was running for office in 2023 and 2024
10:45
Simon Marks as ever putting it clearly from the other side of the ocean thank you very much need
10:50
Look forward to speaking to you next week after the royal visit, the state visit to the United States
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