WASHINGTON— As the United Kingdom negotiates a trade deal with the United States, the country’s leaders are grappling with a new understanding of the “Special Relationship” — namely, that President Donald Trump’s administration is very serious about European nations respecting the rights of their citizens.
Vice President JD Vance roundly condemned Britain’s prosecution of pro-life activists in February, and over the weekend, the State Department announced that it is monitoring the case of Livia Tossici-Bolt, a woman prosecuted for holding a sign near a Bournemouth abortion clinic that reads: “Here to talk if you want.”
“U.S.-UK relations share a mutual respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms,” the State Department’s Democracy, Human Rights, & Labor Bureau said in a statement. “However, as Vice President Vance has said, we are concerned about freedom of expression in the United Kingdom.”
The State Department confirmed to The Daily Wire on Tuesday evening that it is monitoring Tossici-Bolt’s case, that it is important to the United States that the United Kingdom “respect and protect freedom of expression,” as the department said over the weekend, and that State Department senior advisor Sam Samson met with Tossici-Bolt in the United Kingdom recently.
Sources close to the situation told The Daily Wire that State Department officials held bilateral meetings with members of the British government about the topic, including those officials pushing hate speech laws within the United Kingdom. The United States has emphasized that its alliance with the United Kingdom must be civilizational, and that American allies must be on board with American values, including freedom of speech.
Now, headlines from The Telegraph and other high-profile European publications are signaling that the United Kingdom’s censorship of its citizens could actually be a massive deal in regard to the transatlantic relationship.
“No free trade with US without free speech, [British Prime Minister Keir] Starmer warned,” reads a Telegraph headline, with the subhead: “PM’s hopes of avoiding Donald Trump’s tariffs may hinge on case of pro-life activist arrested for peaceful protest.”
“[UK officials] were surprised the U.S. cares about this,” one source shared. “It’s a field of diplomacy that hasn’t been addressed.”
A source familiar with the trade negotiations told The Telegraph that there should be “no free trade without free speech” — likely a point of concern to British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s attempts to strike a free trade deal with the United States. It’s a big change for British leaders used to dealing with President Joe Biden’s administration, which, one source pointed out to The Daily Wire, wasn’t worried at all about the matter — in fact, he was jailing pro-life activists within the United States.
US Vice President JD Vance during the Munich Security Conference in Munich, Germany, on Friday, Feb. 14, 2025. Photographer: Alex Kraus/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Tossici-Bolt is one of several pro-life activists who believe that abortion is the murder of an unborn child and have sought to change hearts on the matter through silent protest and prayer outside of abortion clinics. Abortion clinic “buffer zone” laws in the United Kingdom prohibit these basic activities, and authorities have arrested individuals like Isabel Vaughn-Spruce as they silently pray in buffer zones, accusing them of illegal protest.
A verdict in Tossici-Bolt’s case is due Friday, according to the Telegraph.
The publicity around the issue prompted Kemi Badenoch, a conservative member of Parliament, to warn that free speech in Britain is “at risk” and that the United Kingdom should not be “persecuting people for expressing themselves.”
“We have freedom of expression in this country, we have free speech in this country,” she said. “However, it is at risk because a lot of people are expanding the law way beyond the original intention.”
Britain’s Business Secretary, Jonathan Reynolds, downplayed the matter Tuesday morning on BBC radio, saying, “Obviously there are things from different people in the administration that they’ve said in the past about this, but it’s not been part of the trade negotiations that I’ve been part of.”
Meanwhile, free speech allies like ADF International are thrilled that the United States has spoken up.
“We are very grateful to the US for standing up for freedom of speech in Great Britain at a time when our leaders are intent on censoring us. This censorship has been happening gradually over decades but the implications of it are being fully realized now,” Lorcan Price, an Irish barrister and legal counsel for ADF International, told The Daily Wire on Tuesday evening.
“It is right for the US to call out human rights abuses in the UK out of concern as a close ally — at times it is necessary for allies to speak frankly and truthfully to each other and this is one of those times,” he added. “We sincerely hope that the increased attention on Livia’s prosecution will lead to a return to free speech in the UK.”
Vance condemned the United Kingdom’s censorship in strong terms when he spoke at the Munich Security Conference in February, arguing that “free speech in Britain and across Europe “was in retreat,” and referencing the story of Adam Smith Connor, an army veteran who prayed outside an abortion clinic in the United Kingdom on behalf of his unborn son, who his girlfriend aborted years earlier.
The vice president told the gathered world leaders: “Adam was found guilty of breaking the government’s new buffer zones law, which criminalizes silent prayer and other actions that could influence a person’s decision within two hundred meters of an abortion facility.”
Speaking Tuesday evening at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C., at the premiere of Rod Dreher’s “Live Not By Lies” documentary, Vance argued that if citizens around the world “speak the truth, if we refuse to live by lies, then I think we can redeliver on the promise of civilization.”
“We can rebuild the kind of society where virtue and freedom in our ancient liberties are preserved and enforced, and facilitated by our government, rather than torn down by our government,” the vice president said, adding, “You see, in Europe, people arrested for praying, and you have the police asking them, well what are you praying about? As if it was any of the police’s business.”
As for Tossici-Bolt herself, she said Monday that she’s grateful to the United States for “prioritizing the preservation and promotion of freedom of expression and for engaging in robust diplomacy to that end”.
“It deeply saddens me that the UK is seen as an international embarrassment when it comes to free speech,” she told The Telegraph. “My case, involving only a mere invitation to speak, is but one example of the extreme and undeniable state of censorship in Great Britain today.”
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