Donald Trump has claimed he cancelled an interview with Piers Morgan due to an intervention from Boris Johnson.
As part of a wide-ranging ranging interview with the former US president aired on Monday night, the ex-Good Morning Britain presenter said the pair had been due to meet for an interview in December 2019 in London “just before the pandemic”.
However, Morgan went on to claim the interview was cancelled at the last minute by Mr Trump due to a request from the prime minister.
Mr Trump confirmed that it “was true” and said he was in the UK as Mr Johnson’s guest so would do what he asked him.
The 75-year-old said he “did not know” why Mr Johnson didn’t want him to sit down with the TV host for an interview.
The former editor of the Daily Mirror said he thought the reason might be that the duo might “create something that would cost him the election”, which was only a few days after the planned meet-up.
Mr Trump added that he “liked” the prime minister, but that “he’s getting a little bit liberal, he’s getting a little bit green.”
The businessman and media personality also touched on continued speculation that he will choose to run for president in 2024.
He said he could not reveal if he will run for office again but added that “a lot of people are going to be very happy”.
Mr Trump also shared his thoughts on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, saying the war was “terrible”, and outlined what action he would have taken against Russian leader Vladimir Putin if he was still the US president.
He said: “We’re going to be ashamed at what we’ve done, or what we haven’t done to stop this catastrophe.
“This is a catastrophe. This is in a way already a world war.”
When dealing with Mr Putin, Mr Trump said: “I would say we have far more (nuclear weapons) than you do, far more powerful than you and you can’t use that word ever again.
“You cannot use the nuclear word ever again. And if you do, we’re going to have problems.”
In the opening monologue for the launch of his show on Monday night, Mr Morgan said the mission statement of his show is to “cancel cancel culture”.
He added: “I’ll defeat this insidious, joyless societal scourge with those most effective of democracy-preserving weapons - common sense and truth.”
The show is part of new channel TalkTV, a venture from News UK, the publisher of The Times and The Sun.
No10 has been approached for comment.
