King Charles arrives for a visit with Trump to highlight the nations’ “special relationship”. Here’s what you need to know.

Washington – King Charles III and Queen Camilla arrived in the US on Monday for their first visit like kings. This trip, to celebrate the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, comes on a difficult time on US-UK relations.

It is unclear how their plans may be affected by the additional security considerations after Saturday night try to shoot at the White House Correspondents’ Dinner where the president, vice president and members of the Cabinet they are not present.

In a statement on Sunday, the palace confirmed that the visit “will continue as planned,” adding, “The King and Queen are very grateful to all who have worked so quickly to ensure this remains the case and look forward to the visit continuing.”

The king and Mr Trump are seeking to strengthen and showcase their countries’ ties at a time when US war with Iran and the president’s derision of NATO threaten to destroy the “special relationship” the two alliances have eroded since World War II.

“This trip will be an opportunity to see the shared history of our two nations; the breadth of economic, security and cultural relations that have developed since then; and the deep people-to-people connections that unite the communities,” the palace said.

This is Charles And Camilla’s place visit will have the usual features of a royal visit: meetings at the White House, i address to Congress and a state dinner hosted by the president. The two are expected to head to the same destination New York on Tuesday to honor the victims of the 9/11 attacks, and stop in Virginia.

King Charles schedule in the US

The king and queen are scheduled to arrive in Washington on Monday afternoon. They will have a private tea with the president and first lady, and a garden party.

They will be welcomed with an official ceremony showing the review of the festival ceremony. King and Mr. Trump will hold a bilateral meeting, while the queen and the first lady have their own meeting.

The king will address a joint session of Congress on Tuesday, followed by a formal dinner that evening at the White House.

Max Bergmann, director of the Europe, Russia and Eurasia program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said he would like to hear what the king has to say in his speech with the law enforcement officers.

“I expect the speech to be of a high standard and my expectation is that it will be somewhat historic – acknowledging that the United States came out of rebellion, but how we overcame that,” Bergmann said.

The question will be, he added, whether the king speaks on issues such as human rights and freedoms that the US and the UK supported together after World War II, and whether the king leans on those principles in a way that may appear critical of the current administration.

It’s a busy time for travel

Many British people, like other Europeans, were critical of the way Mr. While Bergmann said his “basic idea is that this is going to be a feel-good trip” focusing on the two nations’ historic ties, Charles has a serious role to play.

“You have a fine thread and you have to thread it with a very fine needle,” Bergmann said.

Mr. Trump has been highly critical of UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s reluctance to join the US-Israeli war or fight for the Strait of Hormuz, as the UK has allowed the US to use its bases for defense operations. The president also mocked the UK’s aircraft carriers as “toys.”

Mr. Trump told the BBC in a phone interview this week that his relationship with Starmer would only “recover” if Starmer reversed course on what Mr.

Mr. Trump expressed great frustration with NATO for the alliance’s refusal to participate in the effort to fight Iran, which began with US and Israeli strikes on February 28. Mr. Trump has even suggested it is possible leaving NATOof which the US and the UK are founding members.

Liana Fix, senior European fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said US-UK relations “have deteriorated significantly since the early days when Starmer was seen as a ‘Trump whistleblower.’

“The UK’s initial reluctance to allow the use of Iranian military bases has not only upset the Trumpists in DC but also the relationship with NATO, and undermined what was left of the faith of the special relationship,” he said.

Still, Charles is no Starmer, and he has a more positive and less political role to play, Bergmann said.

Most Britons do not look favorably on the king’s visit. A YouGov poll in late March found that 49% of the British public said the tour should be cancelled, compared to 33% who said it should go ahead.

Simon Tisdall, foreign affairs analyst for The Guardian, wrote that the king should speak openly about Mr. Trump in his speech to Congress. In an album titled, “Protocol be damned,” Tisdall wrote that what she called Starmer’s “policy of appeasement” had “failed miserably.”

“Trump will no doubt portray Charles’ attendance at a separate White House banquet as a royal endorsement of the man and his policies,” Tisdall wrote. “And it is this grim prospect of a presidential propaganda coup that has led many in Britain to oppose the visit. Starmer, by contrast, hopes it will restore the tarnished ‘special relationship’.”

The relationship between Charles and Trump

Charles’ mother, Queen Elizabeth II, had the ability to keep the peace with Mr. Charles has also worked extensively in the communications field, Bergmann said.

Although this is his first visit as king, it will be far from the first meeting of the two. Mr. Trump called Charles a “friend.”

Mr. Trump told the BBC this week that he thought the king’s visit could help mend US-UK relations.

“Absolutely,” said the president. “He’s handsome. He’s a sweet man. The answer is definitely yes.”

“I know him well, I have known him for years,” said Mr. Trump told the BBC. “He’s a brave man, and he’s a great man. They can have a positive attitude.”

It is not clear exactly when they first met, but it was more than twenty years ago, when Mr. Trump was a businessman in the New York community. Photos show Melania and Donald Trump talking to Charles at an event at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City in 2005.

Officially, the president and the first lady visited the UK with him in 2019, when Charles was already the Prince of Wales. The Trumps visited again September 2025attending an elaborate dinner hosted by the king and queen at Windsor Castle.

Mr. Trump expressed his sympathy for the king after he became the brother of the king Andrew you are arrested for allegations of public misconduct in office related to revelations from the Epstein files. The king had already stripped Andrew of his royal titles because of his links to Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell. Mr. Trump called the situation with Andrew “very sad.”

Charles’ last official visit to Washington was in 2015, when he was a prince, when he and Camilla met the Obamas.