Donald Trump sent a team of US officials to meet with pro-life campaigners in the UK over fears that Downing Street has been suffocating free speech. A five-person outfit was sent by the White House to Britain, to interview five activists who had been arrested for protesting outside abortion clinics.
Washington sent the delegation after becoming concerned over the British government’s increasing habit of using the force of the law to clamp down on speech. It is the latest example of pressure being applied by the Trump administration on the British Prime Minister, after Vice-President JD Vance challenged Sir Keir Starmer’s visit to the Oval Office in February.
During the meeting, in front of the world’s media, he said: “We also know that there have been infringements on free speech that actually affect not just the British — of course what the British do in their own country is up to them — but also affect American technology companies and, by extension, American citizens.”
Sir Keir pushed back on Mr Vance’s assertion, arguing his Government “wouldn’t want to reach across U.S. citizens, and we don’t, and that’s absolutely right.”
During Mr Vance’s address at the Munich Security Conference, he claimed that “free speech in Britain and across Europe was in retreat”.
The latest effort by US officials to police free speech in the UK came when diplomats from the US Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (DRL) travelled to London in March. The delegation was there to “affirm the importance of freedom of expression in the UK and across Europe”, according to The Telegraph.
Led by Samuel Samson, a senior adviser in the state department, the group met with officials from the Foreign Office and challenged Ofcom over the Online Safety Act, which is thought to be a point of for Trump ally Elon Musk.
During the trip, the delegation also met with Isabel Vaughan-Spruce, Rose Docherty, Adam Smith-Connor, Livia Tossici-Bolt and Father Sean Gough, a Catholic priest, who described their experiences of being detained while silently praying outside abortion clinics.
Mrs Docherty, a 74-year-old grandmother, was the first person to be arrested and charged under a new provision which creates buffer zones outside hospitals and clinics providing abortions in Scotland. She was detained outside Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow in February this year.
“All I did was stand peacefully offering consensual conversation to anyone who wanted to take up my offer to talk. I didn’t break the law, I didn’t influence, I didn’t harass, I didn’t intimidate”, she said.
“And yet, I was arrested just for standing there, peacefully, within 200m of a hospital.
“This can’t be just. It’s heartening that others around the world, including the US government, have realised this injustice and voiced their support.”
A state department spokesman said: “US-UK relations share a mutual respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms. However, as vice-president Vance has said, we are concerned about freedom of expression in the UK.
“It is important that the UK respects and protects freedom of expression.”
The Cabinet Office has not commented.