Rebalancing the UK-US Power Dynamic
A recent article by John Simpson of the BBC described 2025 as the year that Donald Trump “shreds global norms”.
We are only a few months into this latest presidency, but that assessment already feels like a euphemistic understatement. In recent remarks, Trump compared himself to a king. He might have played that off as a joke, yet his actions in office are like those of someone who genuinely believes that they have absolute, God-given power over all aspects of the state and government.
For those of us watching from afar, this manifests itself in the new regime’s approach to foreign policy. Whether it is trying to buy Greenland, gutting the United States Agency for International Development or negotiating with Vladimir Putin behind Ukraine’s back, those of us in the UK can only look on with a feeling of surprise and despair.
Even our government seems like it does not know how to respond to the erratic outbursts of what was once our most reliable ally on the global stage.
In one interview this weekend, the Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson, said that Trump was right to engage with Putin in peace talks. Meanwhile, Keir Starmer rejected the president’s rhetoric around Ukraine’s President Zelensky being a dictator.
The UK will only be able to sit on the fence in this way for so long.
As the Trump presidency continues, that administration will only grow more bold and reckless when it comes to geopolitics.
The time is soon coming when the UK will have to seriously push back against the excesses of American foreign policy.
This week on the podcast, we discuss how the UK’s Supreme Court is already pushing back against the imperialist tendencies of the United States.
For a long time, many political and legal commentators have felt that there is an imbalance in the extradition treaty between the UK and the United States. It has certainly been easier for British nationals to be extradited to America compared to British efforts to force Americans to face justice here in the UK.
Part of the reason for that is the broad interpretation that the courts have given to the Extradition Act 2003 since the House of Lords decision in Cando Armas from 2005.
That judgment has been used as authority for extradition in cases where the relevant conduct did not even take place in the requesting state but did have an impact there.
In this most recent case, the Justices have tightened the definition so that it is now closer to what was intended when the Extradition Act received Royal Assent.
Tune in to the podcast and hear their reasoning as well as broader discussion around the impact of this decision.
Episode link: https://uklawweekly.com/2025-uksc-3/
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