Vance has previously described Britain under Labour as the first “truly Islamist” country with a nuclear weapon.
Lammy told BBC Breakfast: “Let me just say on JD Vance that I’ve met him now on several occasions, we share a similar working class background with addiction issues in our family. We’ve written books on that. We’ve talked about that.
“And we’re both Christians so I think I can find common ground with JD Vance.”
[…]
Expanding on his views on Vance on BBC Radio 4, Lammy said he had started to discuss the US view on global defence at the security conference in Munich in February.“Yes, he has had strong things to say about European defences, and he has had a point of view about Ukraine,” Lammy said. “That’s why I’ve been engaged with JD Vance for many, many months.”
The foreign secretary once called Donald Trump a “neo-Nazi sociopath” and “a tyrant in a toupee”, but has distanced himself from those comments as the US presidential election has approached.
More recently Lammy has spoken at conservative events in the US, telling the Hudson Institute in May that he “gets the agenda that drives ‘America first’”.
The thing you need to understand about this “neo reactionary” breed of conservatives is that the only way you’re going to get a really good relationship with them is by joining them in rejecting the international rules based order. He’s an actual American monarchist.
Since that would be a terrible outcome for the world, I would prefer to see us striking a balance of openness but not outright warmth.
And you do not feel that he’s not doing that? He’s talking about Christianity, something he knows doesn’t particularly interest the British people, but some Americans will be somewhat impressed by.
I just feel like you’re criticizing him for doing the bare minimum anyone would expect of him without really offering an alternative course. Open but not warm seems to be the best we could hope for.
You’re not far wrong. I know American politics too well for my own good, but I am still getting to grips with UK politics. Give me a decade or so, I’m a distractible student.