James Forsyth James Forsyth

Don’t send Farage to Washington; invite him to Chevening

Donald Trump has been putting the cat amongst the diplomatic pigeons—again. His tweet suggesting that Nigel Farage should be made the UK’s ambassador to the US couldn’t have been better designed to wind up the UK government by reminding everyone that it is the leader of Britain’s third party—not the Prime Minister—who knows the president-elect best.

It also, to put it mildly, rather undermines the current UK ambassador, Kim Darroch, but given Theresa May’s team’s unhappiness with him they might not mind that so much.

Now, obviously, Farage shouldn’t be the UK’s man in Washington. As Farage has admitted, he’s not a natural diplomat and it is hard to imagine Theresa May trusting him in that role.

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