BBC Royal Correspondent Sean Coughlan, said the United Kingdom and the United States currently had “unusually bad relations”.
Britain's King Charles and Queen Camilla are heading off on a state visit to the United States as the UK and US relationship is the most fraught it's been in the past year.
It is anticipated to be a visit full of pomp and circumstance and all sorts of ceremonial, all the pomp that Trump can muster will be rolled out for the King, who he describes as one of his friends.
It comes against the background of pretty fraught relations between the Trump administration and the NATO countries, especially Britain's PM Sir Keir Starmer.
BBC Royal Correspondent Sean Coughlan, said the UK and US currently had “unusually bad relations”.
“The King is travelling to try to perhaps repair some of that damage”, he told The Pat Kenny Show.
“There's a deep well of political hostility going from President Trump towards the UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer.
“It does seem that Trump has maintained a great deal of respect and admiration and also maybe is slightly overawed by the monarchy.
“I think that's the card that the government in Britain is playing.”
He said King Charles III job may be to warm up the relationship between the two countries and get Trump to get back on side.
Charles and Camilla at Powerscourt House. Picture by: Alamy.“There have been all sorts of ups and downs and the Iran war has been a big [area of contention]”, he explained.
“Trump's assertion that somehow the UK should have followed the US line, which they haven't done, has created a lot of tension.
“There's stuff like the picture of Trump with the AI generated picture where he looked a little bit like Jesus with light coming from his palms and the row over British involvement in Afghanistan.”
What the royal visit will entail for UK and US relationship
He told The Pat Kenny show that the last thing people wanted was having President Trump be able to have freewheeling thoughts on the relationship with Britain.
Donald J. Trump and first lady Melania Trump. Credit: Ken Cedeno.
“I think there'll be very little [opportunities for awkward questions to appear]”, he said.
“I think that the visit has been very carefully structured to minimise the opportunity to allow President Trump to go off script.
“So in practice the chat between the King and Donald Trump in the White House is going to be private.
“The set piece speeches are set piece speeches in the sense that they're carefully scripted and they're not an open exchange.
“However, [Donald Trump] is not a man given to predictability.”
Mr Coughlan, suggested that the name Jeffrey Epstein could cast a long shadow on the visit and even “haunt” it.
Main Image: King Charles III during a visit to the Kellogg’s factory, PA Wire.
