Brexit provides a “wonderful” opportunity to strike a “big and ambitious” free trade deal, Theresa May and Donald Trump agreed in talks in New York.
The US president said the Prime Minister is doing a very, very good job and is a great friend at the start of the meeting.
Mr Trump made a public apology at the time for an explosive interview where he said the PM’s Brexit plans would kill off a trade deal with America and predicted Boris Johnson would be a “great prime minister”.
“She’s working very hard, like all us, and doing a very, very good job.
“We spent a lot of time together on my last trip to the UK and I think that’s where we can say we got to know each other and it was like meeting after meeting after meeting and I said this is really good.
“Every meeting became better and better.
“I will say that we are talking about a lot of different things today, trade, military, security, protection all sorts of things.
“We have a myriad of things to talk about.
“I just want to say it’s great to be with you and it’s great to have you as a friend.”
“They agreed that Brexit provides a wonderful opportunity to strike a big and ambitious UK-US Free Trade Agreement.”
Mrs May hailed the “deep and enduring” relationship between the UK and US.
She said: “The relationship between the US and UK is a really special one, deep and enduring, but there’s much for us to talk about as we go forward together, particularly obviously the ambitious and wide ranging trade deal that we want to do between the UK and US, but also our security partnership and defence partnership and those many challenges we are facing around the world and how we can cooperate.”
Mr Trump added: “And we will talk about them and come up with solutions and answers.”
She added: “In relation to a trade deal in the future I would say President Trump and America want to do a good trade deal with us.
“It’s in both our interests to do that good trade deal.
“And I believe that when we have negotiated that deal that indeed will be put in place.”
Mrs May told how she copes with the demands of dealing with the Brexit negotiations.
She said: “Throughout my working career whatever job I’m doing, whatever job I’m taking on, I take a very simple approach to it that you focus on where you want to get to and then work out how to get there and then just do that and put it into practice.
“Yes different jobs have different challenges.
“If you believe in your goal that’s how you get there.
“I believe absolutely in delivering on the people’s vote and doing it in the best way for the UK.”
