Trump says Starmer 'will resign' as Prime Minister after 'failing badly' on immigration and energy
Around 100 Labour MPs have told Sir Keir that he needs to step down
Donald Trump has weighed in on the debate on Sir Keir Starmer's precarious future as Prime Minister, stating he "will resign".
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The US President's comments on social media come after a weekend of speculation on whether Sir Keir will step down as leader of the Labour Party on Monday.
Starmer has insisted he would fight any leadership contest, with Downing Street palying down reports that he has plans to step down from the role.
The PM claimed he would face off any challenge on Friday morning, following the sweeping victory of elected Labour MP Andy Burnham in the Makerfield by-election.
Around 100 Labour MPs have told Sir Keir that he needs to step down, and he has reportedly told him that he needs to set out a timeline for his exit by Tuesday or face humiliation.
LBC understands that while the PM and Donald Trump speak regularly, they have not spoken this afternoon and the President is not getting any "insider information" from the UK.
Trump is said to be "very engaged" with what is happening with Starmer's future and has repeatedly criticised the PM over the UK's position on the Iran war and the Chagos Islands deal in the past.
Trump wrote on Truth Social: "Keir Starmer will resign as Prime Minister of The United Kingdom. He failed badly on two very important subjects- IMMIGRATION AND ENERGY (OPEN NORTH SEA OIL!). I wish him well!"
The President has repeatedly expressed criticism about Sir Keir, particularly in recent months when the Prime Minister refused to pull the UK into America's war with Iran.
When asked in May whether Starmer should resign as Prime Minister, Trump told reporters that he thinks Sir Keir is "a nice man".
Trump said: “It’s a tough thing.
“Unless he can straighten out immigration, where he’s weak, and if he doesn’t start drilling and stop with the windmills all over the place that are causing havoc.
“But I mean, I didn’t like what he said ‘We’re going to send ships as soon as you’re finished with the war’. Well, we are sort of finished militarily, pretty much."
Baroness Harriet Harman has drawn a comparison between Labour's position when the party was elected to power under Tony Blair in 1997 and Starmer's now.
Labour had a "grace period" where they were able to make "loads of mistakes" because voters had "rejected" the opposition at the time.
The same was true for David Cameron in 2010, Baroness Harman said, in that "nobody wanted to hear" from Labour and the party wasn't a "credible political force".
She told Lewis Goodall on LBC: "I think that what he's done is absolutely remarkable.
"He's taken the Labour Party from the absolute wilderness of opposition into government and has done a great many good things which represent Labour values, which are in the national interest since he's been in government.
"But I think he's faced a difficulty that other prime ministers coming into government from opposition have never faced, and that is an unvanquished opposition.
"What's happened with Keir Starmer is that although the Tories are vanquished, Reform is an unvanquished opposition and he's had no period of grace to get into the position of being Prime Minister, which is incredibly challenging in very, very challenging times, without this insurgent force of Reform."