'I wish him well': Trump changes his mind about Kim Darroch after reading the ambassador compared him to the Terminator

Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP; Niall Carson/PA Images via Getty

US President Donald Trump at Morristown Municipal Airport, New Jersey, in July 2019; and Kim Darroch, the UK's ambassador to the US, at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, in May 2019.

• Donald Trump backtracks on his criticisms of the UK's ambassador to the US after learning that Kim Darroch compared him to Arnold Schwarzenegger in the Terminator.
• The president told reporters on Friday that Darroch had said some "very good things about me".
• Darroch was forced to resign this week after the president sent a series of tweets labeling the ambassador "stupid" and "whacky" and insisting he wouldn't work with him in future.
• "I wish the British ambassador well," Trump said on Friday.
• Visit Business Insider's home page for more stories.

Donald Trump appears to have made a dramatic change in his opinion about the UK's ambassador to the US, after reading a tweet which revealed that the now departing diplomat had compared the president to Arnold Schwarzenegger in the Terminator.

Kim Darroch was forced to resign earlier this week after his confidential comments about the president were leaked to the press.

In the memos, which were leaked to the Mail on Sunday newspaper, Darroch described Trump's White House as "dysfunctional," "inept" and "incompetent."

The leak, led to a series of tweets from Trump in which he attacked Darroch as "stupid" and "whacky" and called prime minister Theresa May's handling of Brexit a "mess."

Darroch quit, saying it was now "impossible" for him to continue in the job.

However, following Darroch's resignation, Trump came across a Tweet from Lindsay Graham, which contained another excerpt from the leaks in which the UK's ambassador compared Trump to Arnold Schwarzenegger's character in the Terminator and suggested that the president could win a second term in office.

On Trump's chances of a second term, Darroch wrote that "Trump may emerge from the flames, battered but intact, like Schwarzenegger in the final scenes of the Terminator."

Trump said on Friday that he was now pleased with these "very good things" Darroch had said about him and offered him his best wishes.

"I wish the British ambassador well," he told reporters.

"Some people just told me -- too bad -- but they said he actually said very good things about me. He was sort of referring to other people and I guess I quoted Lindsay Graham today.

"He said some things that were pretty nice from the British ambassador. But look I wish the British ambassador well but they've got to stop their leaking problems there just like they've got to stop them in our country."

Watch Trump wish Kim Darroch well

The row has dominated debate this week in the UK, where the former Foreign Secretary, Boris Johnson is the favourite to replace Theresa May as prime minister.

Johnson's refusal, during a televised debate with his rival for the job Jeremy Hunt, to say Darroch should stay in post, triggered a major backlash against Johnson among his party colleagues and opponents.

Johnson was branded "contemptible" and accused of throwing Darroch "under a bus," by Conservative MPs, while the opposition Labour party labeled Johnson a "Donald Trump patsy."

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