Nigel Farage had to admit he did not “make the cut” to sit in the Capitol rotunda to watch Donald Trump’s inauguration yesterday – but Boris Johnson did.
The Reform UK leader has long cast himself as a close friend to the US president, even offering to be the UK ambassador to Washington for the second Trump administration.
However, he had to admit the limits to that friendship on GB News last night.
When presenter Chris Hope asked if Farage was in the prestigious room in the middle of the Capitol building where Trump was sworn in, Farage haltingly replied: “No, no, no... didn’t make the cut, sadly.
“I had a good seat... but, no, I mean, look. Frankly, err, it... you know.”
Hope said: “I saw Boris Johnson in there, in rotunda, is he now the person Trump speaks to more than you?”
“No, he’s a former prime minister of the nation,” Farage said, slightly angrily. “He’s an occasional friend of Donald Trump.
“He supports Donald Trump when he’s going up and he doesn’t support Donald Trump when he’s going down. And I’ve supported him consistently now for almost a decade.”
Johnson has quite the on-off friendship with Trump, having slammed him in 2015 for “betraying a quite stupefying ignorance” for falsely saying there were “no-go zones” in London and claiming that he was “unfit” to become president.
While they spoke highly of one another while Trump was in office for his first term, Johnson then said the outgoing president was “completely wrong” for encouraging his supporters to storm the Capitol in 2021.
But by January 2024, Johnson – no longer PM or MP – said Trump’s return could be a “big win for the world”.
Meanwhile, Farage has been an avid Trump supporter for years, speaking at multiple rallies and flying over to the US repeatedly to back the Republican, despite critics asking why he is not more dedicated to his constituency.
The MP for Clacton was also a robust supporter of Trump’s new right-hand man, tech billionaire Elon Musk – until the world’s richest man turned on him earlier this month.
Hours after Farage told the media the X CEO was a “hero”, Musk claimed Reform needed a new leader because the current one “doesn’t have what it takes”.
The sudden split came after the Reform leader tried to distance himself from imprisoned far-right activist Tommy Robinson, whom Musk claimed should be released from jail.
Farage later said he wanted to “mend” his relationship with Musk.
Johnson was not the only former PM to fly to the US for the inauguration as Liz Truss also attended.
Current PM Keir Starmer was not invited, although that is in line with tradition – no serving UK prime minister has ever attended the swearing-in ceremony of a US president going back to when records began in 1874, according to analysis from the Press Association.