David Lammy, the Deputy Prime Minister and Justice Secretary, claims he rebuked his “good friend”, US Vice President JD Vance, after Vance posted frenzied comments on X following the conviction of Vickrum Digwa for the savage murder of Henry Novak. Vance – whose wife is of Indian origin, the same as Digwa, a British Sikh – said the brutality proved mass migration was killing Western civilisation. Lammy said he told Vance he was wrong during an “agreeable” conversation.
The exchange comes as a YouGov poll this March found 68 per cent of Britons see the US as having a negative impact on the world, up from 57 per cent in January. Labour, Lib-Dem and Green voters are in that camp, alongside a majority of Tory voters and 35 per cent of Reform supporters. Celebrations marking 250 years since American independence this July occur when the country’s democracy is “frailer than it has ever been”, according to the i newspaper. Only one in 10 Europeans see the US as an ally, and a minority trust that the US would defend them if attacked. Eddie Boyle of Falkirk said: “It’s a shame that such a long arrangement between the two countries has been tarnished.”
“Lammy rebukes Vance over migrant murder comments as YouGov poll finds 68% of Britons see US negatively.”
Vance’s comments tapped into a deeper racial divide in America. In Mississippi, Terence Hamilton, 57, has voted since the 1980s in the state’s Second Congressional District, a majority-black district first drawn in 1986 to comply with the Voting Rights Act. He has reliably backed the incumbent Democrat, Bennie Thompson. But the US Supreme Court has now ruled that the Voting Rights Act does not require states to draw such districts, and Mississippi Republicans have rushed to redraw the electoral map in a manner that will dilute black votes – in the name of colourblindness.
Meanwhile, Ethan Chen, 18, from Bethesda, Maryland, is preparing to attend Georgetown University – which he considered a “safety school” – after being rejected by Stanford and Ivy League schools despite a perfect grade-point average and equally impressive test scores. The Supreme Court had barred colleges from discriminating against white and Asian applicants under affirmative action, but Chen believes many schools have continued to use essays and other “soft” factors to practise racecraft under another name. College officials, too, claim to uphold colourblind justice.
As America marks 250 years of independence, the transatlantic bond shows cracks. Maria Miston of Suffolk believes Thatcher and Reagan’s legacy has been tarnished. Lammy’s gentle rebuke did little to satisfy critics who see Vance’s rhetoric as part of a wider drive by Trumpians to “ethnically cleanse” Western nations – an existential threat, the i newspaper argues. With only one in three Reform supporters breaking from anti-American sentiment, the question of how closely Britain should tie itself to a frailer ally remains unanswered.