Twitter-Obsessed President Strains Relationship With London Mayor

President Trump’s reacted to the terrorist attacks that occurred last week as much as his predecessors might have. He called the British Prime Minister to offer his condolences and expressed his solidarity with the country.

However, the president did not waste any time in using the attack as a way to defend his highly controversial travel band on visitors from densely Muslim populated countries. In doing so, he also used this as an opportunity to criticize the judges who have chosen to block it. Even further, Trump made statements which mischaracterized the mayor of London, urging that he was not tough enough on terrorism in the city.

This has strained the already tense trans-atlantic relationship, and has removed the United States even further from it’s traditional European allies. Trump’s critique of the London Mayor has set off a chain reaction in the media, and has triggered polarized opinions.

While most would agree that Trump has a knack for starting arguments, his particular way of handling certain situations has begun to exasperate foreign leaders who are not accustomed to the Twitter-obsessed President’s way of resolving conflict. In the modern era, we seem to be struggling in the area of international diplomacy due to the President’s recent antics. His nationalist “America first” approach has stirred a great deal of complaints overseas.

Trump pointed fingers at Sadiq Kahn, Mayor of London, in a Tweet claiming, “At least 7 dead and 48 wounded  in terror attack and Mayor of London says there is ‘no reason to be alarmed’. Either the president had misunderstood what the Mayor had said or he distorted it, but during an interview with BBC, Kahn said that he was ‘appalled and furious that these cowardly terrorist would target innocent civilians and vowed that, “we will never let them win nor will we allow them to cover our city.”

One of the Mayor’s officers later dismissed Trump’s tweet, claiming that the mayor was too busy to reply, stating that Kahn “has more important things to do than respond to Donald Trump’s ill-informed tweet that deliberately takes out of context his remarks urging Londoners not to be alarmed when they saw more police- including armed officers- on the streets.”

The tension between Trump and Kahn has been especially high over the past year. Kahn is the first Muslim to serve as the Mayor of a major Western European Capital. He was extremely unhappy with Trump’s proposal to temporarily ban all Muslims from entering the United States, and thereby chose to endorse Hilary Clinton during the 2016 presidential race.

Featured Image via Flickr/Micheal Vadon