David Lammy has refused to back down on branding US President-elect Donald Trump a ‘neo-Nazi sympathiser’ in the past, as he insists it’s ‘old news’.

The Foreign Secretary has come under intense scrutiny for comments he made in 2018 when he described Trump as a ‘woman-hating, neo-Nazi sympathising sociopath’.

Among the other barbs directed at Trump by Mr Lammy on social media include the quip: ‘If Trump did GCSEs he wouldn’t make it to sixth form.’

Calls have been made for Mr Lammy to be sacked ahead of Trump returning to the White House, with top US analyst Nile Gardiner telling Sir Keir Starmer ‘it’s the smartest thing to do’.

But Downing Street has pushed back and took the unusual step to say Mr Lammy would be remaining in his post until the end of the Parliament.

Mr Lammy, who also once called the president-elect a ‘tyrant in a toupee’, last night told BBC’s Newscast podcast that he believes he can find ‘common ground’ with Trump.

And he tried to justify making the embarrassing jibes saying you would ‘struggle to find any politician’ who had not said some ‘pretty ripe things’ about Trump in the past.

‘I think that what you say as a backbencher and what you do wearing the real duty of public office are two different things,’ Mr Lammy said.

‘And I am foreign secretary. There are things I know now that I didn’t know back then.’

The BBC’s political editor Chris Mason told Mr Lammy his back catalogue of quotes mattered as Trump could in the future decide to ‘weaponise these’ and that’s to ‘our [the UK’s] detriment’.

But he brushed it off as he made reference to a dinner he and the Prime Minister had with Trump in New York in September.

Looking uncomfortable as he shifted in his chair and tapped his hands on his thighs, Mr Lammy said: ‘He didn’t seem to think it mattered a few weeks ago.’

He added: ‘And in the end he [Trump] is finding common ground just as I’m finding common ground.’

Mr Lammy added that Trump was ‘someone that we can build a relationship with in our national interest’ and praised his election campaign as ‘very well run’.

KEIR STARMER

Last year, Sir Keir compared the Conservative Party with Mr Trump as he accused the Tories of falling far from Churchillian values.

‘Is there anybody in the Government now who feels a sense of obligation to anything other than their own self-interest? To democracy, the rule of law, serving our country?’ he asked in a speech in Buckinghamshire.

‘An entitlement to power totally unchecked by any sense of service or responsibility – that’s the cultural stain that runs through the modern Conservative Party.’

He added: ‘These aren’t Churchill’s Tories any more. If anything they behave more and more like Donald Trump. They look at the politics of America and they want to bring that here.

‘It’s all woke, woke, woke. Wedge, wedge, wedge. Divide, divide, divide.’

In June, the prime minister said following Mr Trump’s hush money trial conviction that it was an ‘unprecedented situation’.

‘We will work with whoever is elected president … that’s what you’d expect,’ Sir Keir said.

‘We have a special relationship with the US that transcends whoever the president is, but it is an unprecedented situation, there is no doubt about that.’

In the lead up to this year’s US presidential election, Sir Keir maintained that the Government will work with whoever is president.

FOREIGN SECRETARY DAVID LAMMY

In 2017, Mr Lammy called Mr Trump a ‘racist and KKK/neo-Nazi sympathiser’.

A year later, the Tottenham MP wrote in Time magazine that he would be protesting against the then-government’s ‘capitulation to this tyrant in a toupee’, in reference to Mr Trump’s first official visit to the UK.

‘Trump is not only a woman-hating, neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath,’ Mr Lammy wrote, ‘he is also a profound threat to the international order that has been the foundation of Western progress for so long.’

Asked about his past comments earlier this year, Mr Lammy said: ‘Where I can find common cause with Donald Trump, I will find common cause’.

He offered his congratulations to Mr Trump on Wednesday morning, saying: ‘We look forward to working with you and @JDVance in the years ahead.’

DEPUTY PM ANGELA RAYNER

Ms Rayner has publicly criticised Mr Trump more than once in posts on X, formerly Twitter.

On the day of the Capitol Hill riots in 2021, she tweeted: ‘The violence that Donald Trump has unleashed is terrifying, and the Republicans who stood by him have blood on their hands.’

Later in January that year, Ms Rayner said of the inauguration of Joe Biden as president: ‘I am so happy to see the back of Donald Trump, but even more so to see @KamalaHarris as VP.’

HEALTH SECRETARY WES STREETING

In 2017, Mr Streeting called Trump an ‘odious, sad little man’ in a post on X.

‘Imagine being proud to have that as your president,’ he added.

Asked on Tuesday about the social media post, the Health Secretary told Good Morning Britain: ‘The Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary have been working hard to build a relationship with President Trump and his team, so that in the event that he is elected as the next president of the United States, we start with the strong working relationship which is in our national interest and in the interests of the United States as well.’

ENERGY SECRETARY ED MILIBAND

Mr Miliband labelled Mr Trump a ‘groper’ and a ‘racist’ in November 2016.

‘The idea that we have shared values with a racist, misogynistic, self-confessed groper beggars belief,’ Mr Miliband told the BBC.

‘And I think we should be deeply worried about the implications for many of the things that we care about. Tackling climate change – he says it’s invented by the Chinese, climate change, it’s a hoax. His attitude to Russia.

‘And then this fantasy about trade. I mean, this guy is anti-trade. He’s an odd combination of protectionism, plus the old trickle-down formula that has got us into a lot of this mess in the first place.’

‘I felt in my bones that there could be a Trump presidency,’he added.

The Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary met Trump for dinner in New York in September.

When asked if his past comments had been brought up when he met Trump for dinner, Mr Lammy said ‘not even vaguely’.

He added: ‘I know this is a talking point today, but in a world where there’s war in Europe, where there’s a tremendous loss of life in the Middle East, where the US and the UK genuinely have a special relationship, where we got someone who’s about to become again, the US president, who has experience of doing the job last time round, we will forge common interests,’ he said.

‘We will agree and align on much and where we disagree, we’ll have those conversations as well, most often in private.’

Sir Keir is facing a major headache with Mr Trump’s stunning US election win, after tensions flared over Labour supporters helping to campaign for the Democrat contender.

Mr Trump’s team filed an official complaint with federal election authorities accusing Labour of making ‘illegal foreign national contributions’.

Around 100 activists travelled to swing states to canvass for the Harris ticket – although Labour insisted they went at their own expense.

US analyst Mr Gardiner predicted there would be Congressional hearings on the use of Labour activists, not least because Republicans have won back control of the Senate with the House still to play for.

‘I think Keir Starmer is in the dog house right now and I’m not sure he would be welcome at Mar-a-Lago right now,’ Mr Gardiner said.

‘Sir Keir is viewed as part and parcel of the Harris operation’.

Firing Mr Lammy for his ‘vicious’ attacks on Mr Trump would be a start, Mr Gardiner said.

He said: ‘The smartest thing would be to sack David Lammy and apologise for the intervention by Labour staffers.

‘But I’m in no doubt that it will be practically impossible for Sir Keir to work with the Trump Presidency’.

Earlier this week, during PMQs, Tory leader Kemi Badeonch asked Sir Keir if he had apologised for Mr Lammy’s past remarks.

In response, the PM said his meeting with the Foreign Secretary and president-elect Trump just a few weeks ago was a ‘very constructive exercise’.

Ms Badenooch insisted that Sir Keir must invite Mr Trump to visit the UK and address both Houses of Parliament.

When Mr Trump was last president Labour MPs including Mr Lammy signed an early day motion arguing he should not be allowed the honour of addressing both Houses of Parliament during a state visit.

Meanwhile, the PM has also repeatedly clashed with billionaire Elon Musk, who looks certain to end up playing a key role in the Trump administration.

Government sources have been playing up the private dinner Sir Keir and Mr Lammy had with Mr Trump in New York in September, insisting they had struck up a good relationship.

There was also anger that senior figures from the party went to the Democratic National Convention in August and met Harris aides. The two parties have long-term ties.

Ms Badenoch said in the Commons: ‘I would like to start by congratulating President-elect Trump on his impressive victory this morning.

‘The Prime Minister and the Foreign Secretary met him in September. Did the Foreign Secretary take that opportunity to apologise for making derogatory and scatological references, including, and I quote, ‘Trump is not only a woman-hating Neo-Nazi sympathising sociopath, he is also a profound threat to the international order’, and if he did not apologise, will the Prime Minister do so now on his behalf?’