Brexit has ‘exposed consequences’ of leaving EU says Barnier

The US President took over the White House from his pro-Brexit rival Donald Trump on Wednesday. Britain was finally freed from the shackles of the European Union on January 1 and Boris Johnson hopes to strike a lucrative transatlantic partnership with the US. But, the changing of the guard in the US could have a detrimental impact on the chances of a trade deal being reached, as Mr Biden has previously made his anti-Brexit view public and is set to strengthen relations with Europe.

Ben Harris-Quinney, a former foreign policy adviser to the UK and EU, has said Mr Biden will eventually want the UK to rejoin the EU27.

The Chairman of the independent Bow Group think-tank, claimed Mr Biden would not give the UK a better trade deal than the US currently has with the EU, amid fears of fuelling an exodus from the bloc.

Speaking to Express.co.uk, Mr Harris Quinney said: “We have a President who will consider the EU, not Britain, to be his closest ally, and ultimately will want Britain to rejoin the EU in the future.

“Biden won’t agree to any deal that gives us a clear advantage over the deal the US has with the EU, or that makes it more likely other nations will want to leave the bloc in the future.”

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Britain voted to leave the EU five months before Mr Trump won the US election back in November 2016, and Mr Harris-Quinney described the failure to seal an agreement during his term in office as the “one of the greatest foreign policy catastrophes in recent British history”.

He added: “President Trump was a more passionate believer in Brexit than Boris Johnson, he is also a committed Anglophile.

“We had four years to agree a deal while he was President that would have given us a competitive advantage over the EU in our biggest global trade deal, which was one of the fundamental factors of Brexit being a success in the short to medium term.”

Mr Biden has already outlined his vision for his first few months in office.

Speaking earlier this month, the 78-year-old stated he would not enter into any trade deals with other countries and would favour domestic investment.

He told the New York Times: “I’m not going to enter any new trade agreement with anybody until we have made major investments here at home and in our workers and in education.”

Mr Biden added: “I want to make sure we’re going to fight like hell by investing in America first.”

The new US President has previously served as second in command during the Barack Obama administration from 2009-2017.

Prior to the EU referendum in 2016, former president Obama famously said the UK would be at the “back of the queue” for a US trade deal if the British people voted to leave.

During a speech at Chatham House in 2018, Mr Biden admitted he would have voted to stay in the EU if he was British Citizen and claimed “US interests are diminished” with the UK following Brexit.

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He said: “Had I been a Member of Parliament, had I been a British citizen, I would have voted against leaving.

“From the US perspective, US interests are diminished with Great Britain not being an integral part of Europe and being able to bring influence.

“There’s growing awareness that Britain played a role in Europe the last 30 years that went well beyond the notion of open borders and trade, being able to influence attitudes.”

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