The White House Has Denied Reports that Trump Is Putting His UK State Visit On Hold
The White House has denied a report that U.S. President Donald Trump is putting a planned state visit to the U.K. on hold due to backlash over remarks he made after a recent terrorist attack in London. CNN reports that two senior members of the Trump administration have disputed an article published by the Guardian Sunday suggesting that Trump had effectively postponed the visit over concerns that he may be met with protests. The initial report said Trump recently spoke by phone with British Prime Minister Theresa May, reportedly telling her he would not come to London without the support of the public. According to CNN, a senior administration official said the planned state visit "never came up on the call," while a second official also dismissed the report. Trump spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders has also denied the report, according to the New York Times, using the same language as the official cited by CNN. The BBC reports that a spokesperson for Downing Street denied the report as well, saying there had been "no change" to plans for Trump's state visit, for which no date has been set. Trump infuriated Britons with a series of tweets shortly after a terror attack in London killed eight people and injured 48 others on June 3. The U.S. President initially cited the incident in support of his administration's controversial proposal to ban travel from six Muslim-majority countries, and later mischaracterized comments made by London Mayor Sadiq Khan, who Trump criticized as "pathetic.", Read more President Trump's Attack on London Mayor, In the wake of the online feud, Khan told Britain's Channel 4 News that Trump was unwelcome in the U.K. "I don't think we should roll out the red carpet to the President of the U.S.A. in the circumstances where his policies go against everything we stand for," Khan said. CNN,