Fresh from banging his head on the door of Downing Street, John Kerry has just been speaking at a press conference alongside Boris. But it wasn’t the US Secretary of State coming to blows during the heated Q and A session at the Foreign Office. John Kerry might be heading home tomorrow, but most of the eyes – and the barbs being flung from the audience of gathered journalists – were aimed squarely at one man: Boris.
American journalists in London for Kerry’s visit appeared to see it as their sole opportunity to hammer the Foreign Secretary – and they certainly tried their best to make the most of it. There was much squirming – most of it from John Kerry – as the inevitable questions about Boris’ Lady Macbeth comparison of Hillary Clinton and his ‘part-Kenyan’ comment about Barack Obama surfaced. There was enough time for Boris to re-assure those gathered that he wanted to re-shape Britain’s profile as an even greater global nation. And when he was asked about Obama’s back of the queue comment, John Kerry was more eager to focus on the positives: he said he wanted to cement the special and unbreakable ties between the UK and US, going on to say that ‘These are more than words, folks’.
So, this was the good news to emerge – no one is going to punish Britain for Brexit, not least the Americans who won’t be shunting Britain to the back of the queue anytime soon. But what about the talking points from a memorable press conference?
Trade talks and Brexit won’t be on many people’s minds after watching this encounter. Instead, it’ll be the attacks on Boris – and his ability to let them bounce off him – which stand out. Despite the increasingly desperate attempts to provoke him, the Foreign Secretary kept his cool and may even have surprised some of those taunting him with how stolid and unflappable he was under sustained attack. Take for instance, the third and final question about his past comments. Boris was asked:
I understand that you don’t want to revisit the past but you have an unusually long history of wild exaggerations and frankly outright lies which few Foreign Secretaries have prior to this job and I am just wondering how Mr Kerry and others can believe what you say.
Many would have lost their rag for much less than that. Not Boris: he shook his head and said ‘Not this one again’. But by the time it was his turn to answer, he was a picture of calm. Instead of lashing out, Boris showed off his serious side – talking of working together, moving forward and focusing on bigger global issues like Syria. Such a deft answer helped Boris to emerge from what could have easily been a bear trap.
Few of those American journalists will have seen Amber Rudd going after Boris during the Brexit debates. But those vicious encounters proved fertile ground for helping Boris deal with today’s onslaught. What’s more, his calmness just now may have even won him some unlikely fans from across the pond. And as if that wasn’t enough, Boris also achieved the impossible: he made a press conference with John Kerry look entertaining.
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