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UK deploys pomp in Trump state visit

Sep 17, 2025, 6:25pm EDT
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Britain’s Queen Camilla, King Charles, U.S. President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump pose for a family photo at the State Banquet.
Phil Noble/Reuters

Donald Trump dined with the British royals at Windsor Castle on Wednesday as pomp and splendor defined the US president’s second state visit to the UK.

London hopes the pageantry and involvement of King Charles will bolster Europe’s efforts to push Trump to pressure Russia into ending the war in Ukraine. Trump, the first US president to be formally welcomed to Windsor, has shown an admiration for the royal family. And Charles, quietly sympathetic to Ukraine, “may be the last man standing who can exude global gravitas in the dumpster fire of our digitally dominated world,” journalist Tina Brown argued.

Still, Wednesday’s spectacle “is unlikely to reassure a world careening from crisis to crisis,” The Washington Post’s London bureau chief wrote.

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