President Trump is rolling out the red carpet for French President Emmanuel Macron during a state visit this week, returning the favor for the dazzling welcome Trump received in Paris last year.
The three-day visit will show off the unlikely friendship between Trump and Macron, who speak by phone frequently and recently launched a coordinated military strike on Syria.
But beneath the flag-draped show of friendship, Macron and Trump disagree on several key issues — a dynamic that could put their relationship to the test.
The president invited his French counterpart to fly with him on Marine One to George Washington’s Mt. Vernon estate on Monday evening for a private tour and dinner with their wives.
Macron will receive a resplendent greeting on the South Lawn on Tuesday morning, complete with a brass band and review of the troops, before meeting with Trump in the Oval Office and being the guest of honor at the U.S. president’s first state dinner.
“What you do have are two leaders who have a great deal of respect for one another, who have a great friendship,” White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Monday.
Few would have predicted such a bond to develop between Trump and Macron, whose election victory last May was seen as a rebuke to Trump’s “America First” brand of politics.
Their awkward first meeting at last year’s NATO summit in Brussels, when they engaged in a lengthy, white-knuckle handshake, seemed to portend years of tensions over world affairs.
The 40-year-old internationalist Macron has instead sought to win over the 71-year-old nationalist Trump, even though Trump is deeply unpopular in France.
Trump was so wowed by the military parade there on Bastille Day last July, during which he was Macron’s guest of honor, that he ordered the U.S. armed forces to explore staging one of their own.
