A trio of Senate Republicans urged President Obama on Monday to remain neutral as Britain debates whether to remain in the European Union.
“Regardless of the outcome of the referendum, citizens of the United Kingdom should know that we will continue to regard our relations with the United Kingdom as a central factor in the foreign, security, and trading policies of the United States,” Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Utah Sen. Mike Lee, and Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions wrote in a letter to the president.
Lee and several House lawmakers sent the same message last week, in advance of the British people going to the polls on June 23. The latest admonishment placed presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump’s biggest congressional ally, Sessions, on the same letterhead with Trump’s strongest opponent, Cruz, during the presidential primaries, on a foreign policy matter.
“The United States, as a nation founded on the sovereign and democratic voice of the American people, must respect the sovereignty of other democratic peoples, and their inalienable right to determine their own destiny,” the letter says. “Any interference in their decision can only harm our relationship.”
Cruz and Sessions have worked together since 2012, but their relationship was strained by Sessions’ endorsement of Trump during the presidential campaign. Still, the letter reflects the same position that Cruz held during the presidential campaign, when he attacked President Obama for suggesting that a post-EU Britain would be “in the back of the queue” when it came to negotiating a free trade agreement with the United States.
“We await the decision of the British people in the certainty that their vote, while it may open new opportunities for cooperation with our British friends and allies, will not diminish any of our vital ties,” the senators wrote. “For us, Britain stands in the front of the line. We invite you to join us in this confidence, to share our belief in the value of an Anglo-American relationship based on democracy and sovereignty, and to end your administration’s misguided effort to pressure Britain into a choice that it would not make of its own free will.”
