The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has accused President Trump of “fanning the flames of divisive, far-right politics around the world,” continuing a long-running feud between the two men.
Mr. Khan, a Labour party politician who became the first Muslim to hold the position in 2016 and has since won two more mayoral elections in Britain’s capital, launched a broadside against Mr. Trump and his administration in an opinion essay published in The Guardian shortly before Air Force One touched down on Tuesday night.
Mr. Trump took a swipe at Mr. Khan during his last visit to Britain in July, calling him “a nasty person” who has “done a terrible job.” He made the comment at a news conference with Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who interjected to call Mr. Khan a “friend.”
The public feud has flared up at several points since 2015, when Mr. Khan called Mr. Trump’s campaign pledge to ban Muslims from entering the United States “outrageous.”
Mr. Trump in 2016 challenged Mr. Khan to an I.Q. test after the London mayor called his views on Islam “ignorant,”, and in 2017 he criticized Mr. Khan’s response to a series of terror attacks in Britain that year.
Ahead of Mr. Trump’s first visit to London as president in 2018, Mr. Khan’s office gave protesters permission to fly a giant balloon depicting Mr. Trump as a baby wearing a diaper.
Mr. Trump again criticized the London mayor’s positions on crime and terrorism during that trip. Ahead of his first state visit in 2019, he called Mr. Khan a “stone-cold loser” on social media.
The two politicians have renewed their public criticism of each other at numerous points over the following years.
In Mr. Khan’s most recent Tuesday essay, he defended London as a safe and inclusive city, while attacking Mr. Trump’s deportation program and National Guard deployments — actions he said were “straight out of the autocrat’s playbook.”
His remarks were a sharp contrast to the conciliatory tone struck by Mr. Starmer’s government, which has attempted to foster a warm relationship with the Trump administration to further cooperation on international politics, defense and trade.
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