President Donald Trump‘s hopes for a warm reception in Scotland, a country to which he has deep personal and business connections, may be dashed by politics.
After making a similar presidential trip in 2018, Trump will be in Scotland from this Friday to next Tuesday to meet with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and, among other “things,” open another golf course at Trump International Scotland in Aberdeenshire.
“We are going to have a meeting with him, probably in Aberdeen, and we’re going to do a lot of different things,” Trump told reporters last week. “We’re going to also refine the trade deal that we’ve had. So we’ll be meeting mostly with the prime minister, at probably one of my properties, or maybe not, depending on what happens, but we’ll be in Aberdeen, in Scotland.”
The new Trump International Scotland golf course represents a merger of the president’s personal and business interests in the country. The MacLeod Course is named after his mother, Mary, who was born on Scotland’s Outer Hebrides and raised a Gaelic-speaker before she immigrated to the United States in 1930 and married his father, Fred.
However, while Trump may have a connection to Scotland, recent polls indicate that the majority of Scots are not attached to the president.
University of Glasgow politics lecturer Michael Frazer, himself an American-British citizen, cited a spring IPSOS poll that reported 71% of Scots disapproved of Trump, more than his 57% disapproval in the United Kingdom more broadly.
“This is not surprising given that Scotland is generally to the left of the rest of the U.K., with arguments for Scottish independence often highlighting how Conservative U.K. governments have imposed all sorts of right-wing policies on Scotland that are unpopular here, including but hardly limited to Brexit,” Frazer told the Washington Examiner.
However, while many local politicians are poised to distance themselves from Trump before Scotland’s parliamentary elections next May, Starmer will be embracing him.
“Starmer has been careful to maintain a cordial relationship with Trump, which he sees as something that benefits the U.K., Europe, and the precarious alliance of democracies worldwide,” Frazer said. “The U.S.-U.K. trade deal and continued support for Ukraine seem to suggest that this friendly approach is paying off, as unpopular as it may be in the U.K. generally and in Scotland in particular.”
While Frazer predicted Trump’s meeting with Starmer would be “dull, in sharp contrast to the dramatics that often occur when Trump meets other world leaders,” the president’s business dealings in Scotland have not been without controversy.
The Aberdeenshire Council dismissed the Trump International Scotland development proposal before the Scottish Government ordered a planning inquiry in 2008, during which the president personally provided testimony. Trump also personally wrote to the Scottish first minister in 2011 to try to prevent a wind farm from being constructed off the Aberdeenshire coast for aesthetic reasons.
That is on top of this trip itself, which has prompted ethical complaints regarding the president mixing business and politics, though predecessors have embarked on other forms of personal travel, including former President Joe Biden and son, Hunter Biden, to Ireland in 2023.
“Leveraging the platform of the presidency to promote a new golf course for personal profit is bad and forcing U.S. taxpayers to foot the bill makes it worse,” Public Citizen democracy advocate Jon Golinger told the Washington Examiner. “Sadly, Trump’s junkets and profiteering have been par for the course with this swampy administration.”
A Trump Organization spokeswoman did not respond to the Washington Examiner‘s requests for comment, but White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt underscored how the Scotland trip was about trade and “other important issues” with Starmer.
“The president greatly looks forward to going to Scotland on Friday,” Leavitt told Fox News. “He will be meeting with the U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who he enjoys a very good and working relationship with. We have cut a really good trade deal with the United Kingdom, again in record time. So the two leaders will be discussing, truly formalizing and finishing up that trade deal.”
Scottish sources tell the Washington Examiner that Trump International Scotland, separate from Trump Turnberry in South Ayrshire, remains controversial, but has support from the likes of Ross Thomson, a former Conservative member of the British parliament who is now a member of Nigel Farage‘s Reform U.K. party.
“There’s a real sense of excitement surrounding the visit,” Thomson told the Washington Examiner. “Having the president of the United States in Aberdeen is a huge moment for our city; it puts us on the world stage. With that global attention comes a major opportunity for Aberdeen, which is currently facing serious challenges due to the rapid deindustrialisation of the region, driven by the political hostility to our oil and gas industry.”
Thomson contended Trump “has done more for Scotland’s economy than many of our own politicians,” imploring the president to encourage Starmer to invest in the energy sector.
“His investment in Aberdeenshire has created jobs, boosted tourism, and firmly placed the North East of Scotland on the international golf map,” he said of Trump. “The new course he’s about to open is extraordinary — his vision of creating the greatest 36 holes in world golf is becoming a reality. That’s not just great news for the local area, but for Scotland as a whole.”
For University of Aberdeen politics lecturer Malcolm Harvey, Trump’s trip to Scotland is “largely an unwelcome one.”
“It causes a headache for the U.K. Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, who has seen his approval rating plummet in the last year — and he now has to welcome an even more unpopular and unpredictable leader whose economic decisions can significantly impact the U.K.,” Harvey told the Washington Examiner. “It causes embarrassment for the Scottish First Minister, John Swinney — finance secretary, when the golf course was approved — who will have to row back on previous comments and support for [former Vice President] Kamala Harris in last year’s election to appease his important visitor. “
Harvey added Trump’s trip similarly “causes a nightmare for local police forces, who will have to pick up the tab for security and policing of the inevitable protests the visit will attract.” Frazer agreed, saying, “Trump’s previous visits to Scotland since his entry into politics were met with large protests, and the same is likely to occur again this time.”
To that end, Aberdeen, Aberdeenshire, and South Ayrshire Council officials have sought to downplay questions and concerns regarding protests.
“Aberdeen City Council policy is to facilitate peaceful protest,” an Aberdeen City Council spokesperson told the Washington Examiner. “Any protest which is not peaceful is a matter for Police Scotland.”
Police Scotland Assistant Chief Constable Emma Bond was adamant that “a policing plan will be in place to maintain public safety, balance rights to peaceful protest, and [minimize] disruption.”
“The visit will require a significant police operation using local, national, and specialist resources from across Police Scotland, supported by colleagues from other U.K. police forces as part of mutual aid arrangements,” Bond told the Washington Examiner.
Scottish Police Federation General Secretary David Kennedy emphasized that “any high-profile presidential visit significantly strains an already stretched policing model in Scotland.”
“The reality is President Trump will be safe; however, it’s the business-as-usual officers that will be [run] ragged and communities in Scotland [that] will suffer as the knock-on effect is considerable,” Kennedy told the Washington Examiner. “Whether the protests end up being smaller than in 2018 or not, you have to plan for the upper end of the forecast. Even a crowd of a few thousand moving between Glasgow Prestwick, Turnberry, and central Edinburgh requires mutual aid, traffic management, and public-order contingents on standby.”
In short, Harvey, the University of Aberdeen lecturer, concluded, “no one — not politicians, not police, not populations — is looking forward to this visit.”
“All our politicians are hoping is that the trip goes relatively smoothly, and that nothing causes further tariffs to be levied on our produce,” he said. “If that is achieved, Starmer and Swinney — and everyone else — will breathe a massive sigh of relief and start planning for the state visit scheduled for September.”
Regarding Starmer’s negotiations with Trump concerning trade and tariffs, Frazer, the University of Glasgow lecturer, argued that “there are still some outstanding issues surrounding the treatment of U.K. steel.”
“As Trump is always toying with introducing other global tariffs on particular products, there may be a question on whether the U.K. will get preferential treatment with regard to these products as well,” he said. “But most of the trade deal is ironed out already, so I think the focus of the discussion is likely to be on Ukraine, NATO, and other non-trade topics.”
Trump’s trip to Scotland made headlines earlier this week after the White House announced the Wall Street Journal would no longer be permitted to accompany the president following its report regarding an alleged 50th birthday card he sent to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in 2003. Trump has denied writing the letter and has taken legal action against the newspaper for $10 billion over its coverage.
“This attempt by the White House to punish a media outlet whose coverage it does not like is deeply troubling, and it defies the First Amendment,” White House Correspondents Association president Weijia Jiang wrote. “Government retaliation against news outlets based on the content of their reporting should concern all who value free speech and an independent media.”