Boris Johnson championed American food as he set out goals for post-Brexit trade and demanded an end to “hysterical” fears about imports from the United States.
“I look at the Americans; they look pretty well-nourished to me,” he said, “and I don’t hear any of these critics of American food coming back from the United States and complaining … so let’s take some of the paranoia out of this argument.”
Johnson is seeking to strike a trade deal with the U.S. as Britain plots its course after Brexit, but opponents say U.S. negotiators will insist on weaker consumer, environmental, and animal protections, which Washington sees as barriers to trade.
So, while campaigners in Britain fear an influx of hormone-treated beef and chicken washed in chlorine, practices banned in Europe, last week, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo warned the United Kingdom not to use food safety arguments as a “ruse” to protect its farmers.
In his first speech since the U.K. left the EU on Friday, the prime minister railed against “America bashers” and said that free trade deals will be governed by science rather than “mumbo jumbo.”
“We will get going with our friends in America, and I share the optimism of President Trump,” he said during a speech in Greenwich, southeast of London, “and I say to all the naive and juvenile anti-Americans in this country, if there are any — there seem to be some — I say, ‘Grow up and get a grip.’ The U.S. already buys one-fifth of everything we export.”
Trump has said the two allies could strike a trade deal with the potential to be “far bigger and more lucrative” than anything possible with the EU.
