This is a true story. As a colleague and I finished interviewing Donald Trump before his first presidential visit to Britain in July 2018, we were accosted by a tall man with a military air and a pen and notebook in hand. He’d been waiting for us outside the grand drawing room of the US Embassy in Brussels where the interview had just taken place. “Hi. John Kelly, White House Chief of Staff,” he introduced himself. “May I ask what the President said to you?”
We reeled off the highlights of the news-rich past half hour as the retired US Marine Corps general made copious notes. How Trump had insulted then British PM Theresa May, how he would have got a far better Brexit deal from the EU, why May’s bête noire Boris Johnson would make a great PM. “He said that? Oh right. I see. Uh huh, hmm …” Kelly grunted as we spoke, which he punctuated with gentle eye rolls.
