December 22, 2019
(Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump has invited British Prime Minister Boris Johnson to visit him in the White House in the new year, Britain’s Sunday Times newspaper reported.
The report added that Trump’s invitation to Johnson was made after the British prime minister’s recent election win. Formal discussions on the exact timing of Johnson’s visit are yet to held, the newspaper reported, citing Downing Street sources.
“Some potential dates have been floated in mid-January but nothing has yet been formally agreed. But it is clear that both sides want to make it happen some time in early 2020,” the report quoted a source close to the White House as saying.
The development comes as Johnson won approval for his Brexit deal in the British parliament on Friday, the first step toward fulfilling his election pledge to deliver Britain’s departure from the European Union by Jan. 31.
The parliamentary approval followed Johnson’s landslide election victory earlier this month.
As Britain prepares to leave the bloc, Johnson and Trump agreed in a phone call on Monday to pursue an “ambitious” UK-U.S. free trade agreement.
After Johnson’s election win, Trump had said Britain and the United States were now free to strike a ‘massive’ new trade deal after Brexit.
“This deal has the potential to be far bigger and more lucrative than any deal that could be made with the E.U.”, Trump had said in a tweet earlier this month.
(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)
