Trump Says He's Surprised Brexit Negotiations Going Poorly

(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump said Thursday he’s surprised that Brexit negotiations have been going poorly and said that the debate over implementing the referendum to leave the EU is tearing the U.K. apart.

“I’m surprised at how badly it’s all gone from the standpoint of the negotiation,” Trump said at the White House Thursday during a meeting with Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar.

Trump spoke as British lawmakers are debating whether to push back the country’s scheduled departure from the European Union after Parliament repeatedly rejected Prime Minister Theresa May’s proposed withdrawal deal, and also signaled they didn’t want to leave without a negotiated agreement.

Trump tweeted earlier in the day that he wants to negotiate a “large scale” trade pact with the U.K. His administration previously said it would begin talks with the U.K. after the country exits the European Union, and would seek a deal reducing tariff and non-tariff barriers for U.S. industrial and farm products. U.K. officials have said a trade agreement could boost economic and national security ties between the two countries.

The president’s comments on Brexit were his most extensive since November, when he criticized the deal May negotiated with the EU and warned that under the arrangement the U.K. might not be able to trade with the U.S.

Varadkar told reporters that there should be “frictionless trade between Britain and Ireland.”

“It’ll be a few years until the U.K. sorts itself out, but in the meantime the EU is available to talk trade with the U.S.," Varadkar said.

Trump said he had given May his ideas on how to negotiate the exit, again signaling disapproval with the approach taken by the British leader.

“She didn’t listen to that,” Trump said, adding he thought “it could have been negotiated in a different manner.”

May said last year in an interview with the BBC that Trump told him he should sue the EU.

The president also said that while he had predicted that British voters would endorse leaving the EU, he wasn’t necessarily a supporter of the exit. In fact, Trump said in an interview with Fox News during the presidential campaign the U.K. would be “better off” outside the EU.

Also Thursday, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he’s not concerned about impacts on the U.S. financial system from Brexit. “I think the banks are well prepared,” he told reporters after a Senate hearing.

In October, David Malpass, a senior Treasury department official, warned that a hard Brexit could hurt global financial stability and said the U.S. was working with officials in the U.K. and EU to limit risks of Britain’s withdrawal from the bloc.

--With assistance from Saleha Mohsin.

To contact the reporter on this story: Justin Sink in Washington at jsink1@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at awayne3@bloomberg.net, Justin Blum, Joshua Gallu

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