Boris Johnson has backed Donald Trump ahead of November’s US presidential election, saying his return to the White House could be “just what the world needs”. In his weekly Daily Mail column, the former prime minister argued that if Trump backs Ukraine in its war against Russia, his renewed leadership “can be a big win for the world”. However, Trump has repeatedly cast doubt on continued US support for Kyiv if he is re-elected, while boasting about his relationship with Russian president Vladimir Putin.
Trump, who has also repeatedly been openly critical of Nato, previously claimed that he could end Russia’s war on Ukraine in 24 hours. Johnson wrote: “I simply cannot believe that Trump will ditch the Ukrainians; on the contrary, having worked out, as he surely has, that there is no deal to be done with Putin, I reckon there is a good chance that he will double down and finish what he started – by giving them what they need to win. “If that is the case, then there is every chance, under Trump, that the west will be stronger, and the world more stable.” Earlier on Friday the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, invited Trump, who is the frontrunner to get the Republican nomination, to visit Kyiv. In an interview with Channel 4 News, the Ukrainian leader said: “Yes please, Donald Trump – I invite you to Ukraine. “If you can stop the war during 24 hours I think it will be enough to come to Kyiv, on any day I am here.” In his column, for which reports suggest the Daily Mail is paying him £1m a year, Johnson wrote that the “global wokerati” feared a Trump victory. “In the cocktail parties of Davos, I am told, the global wokerati have been trembling so violently that you could hear the ice tinkling in their negronis,” he wrote. Elsewhere in his column, Johnson conceded that the former Republican president, who is facing 91 felony charges across four criminal cases, has “been caught saying a few unguarded things”. Johnson claimed that “what the world needs now is a US leader whose willingness to use force and sheer unpredictability is a major deterrent to the enemies of the west”. He also said that Trump is interested in “a proper free trade deal” with Britain, after hopes of a full-blown trade deal were abandoned last year. PA Media contributed to this report