Trump Asked Queen Elizabeth Her Favorite President. Her Answer Was Perfect

Añadido: 2026-05-10

[00:00:01]Susan Paige is Washington bureau chief for USA Today and author of a fabulous new book. It is titled The Queen and Her Presidents. Susan Paige is the author of The Hidden Hand That Shaped History.

[00:00:15]Susan, can I tell you a funny story at the outset? We have a grid.

[00:00:19]>> Please do.

[00:00:19]>> Okay. We have a grid that we use for planning purposes, an Excel spreadsheet.

[00:00:23]And on that grid, I put for the benefit of my producer all the guests that I'd like to pursue to have on this program.

[00:00:30]You've been on the grid for I think like a year because the book was announced and the moment it was announced, I said because it received press, we have got to do that interview. And so periodically I'll say, "Whatever happened to Susan Paige?" And TC, my producer, will say that book doesn't come out until May. We've got her lined up. Don't worry about it. Well, what I most want to tell you is you didn't disappoint. I love the subject matter and so does everybody else as evidenced by the fact that in the acknowledgements and of course I noted this because throughout the course of the book you make reference to these people. Many thanks to all those in the United States and Great Britain who agreed to be interviewed for this book. I am especially grateful for the opportunities to discuss their encounters with the queen with the presidents with presidents, pardon me, Donald Trump, Joe Biden, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, as well as first ladies Jill Biden, Michelle Obama, Hillary Clinton, and with prime ministers Boris Johnson, Liz Truss, and David Cameron.

[00:01:32]They all spoke to you for this book.

[00:01:34]Why? Why did they want to be on record?

[00:01:38]>> You know, uh, Michael, first of all, such a privilege to be on your show.

[00:01:41]Thank you for for asking me and uh yes I was really pleased and grateful that all these folks agreed to talk to me and you know I think it's because they had I think two things they had such great respect for Queen Elizabeth so they were eager to talk about her and secondly she had passed away by the time I started this book and I think if I had been doing this book while she was still alive it would have been a lot harder to get people to dish >> and I I think there's something else going on which maybe you'll confirm and maybe not. Well, I'll explain it this way. I read the whole book. There's my copy. It's all tabbed up, all noted.

[00:02:16]I've got all my post-it notes as evidence, and my questions will evidence, I think, a knowledge of the book. But I got to tell you, I did the Washington read. I went right to the index, and I wanted to find out about Trump because I was just dying to know what you could reveal about the way in which he was perceived from the other side of the pond. What's the Cliff's Note version of that?

[00:02:40]So the President Trump who adored the royal family and Elizabeth in particular was very curious about just that question and when he had his state dinner with Queen Elizabeth in 2019 he peppered her with questions about which president she liked best. Uh you know there may have been other presidents who wondered about that. I bet none of the other dared ask her and she wouldn't answer. He was in fact amazed at how deafly she dodged his question. But he did tell me that after the dinner he was led to believe by others close to the queen that she did have a favorite president and it was him.

[00:03:19]>> Of course, no surprise. From from your book, I said, "So, could I ask you who was your favorite president?" The queen replied, "Why? They were all so good."

[00:03:27]"I know, but did you like Ronald Reagan the best?" Trump asked. "Oh, yes, I liked him very much. But they were all good." Oh, well, what about Nixon? He was excellent. And so on and so forth.

[00:03:37]By the way, I'm sure they all wanted to know what does she think of me. I'd want to know what does the queen think of me if I had had the privilege of meeting her.

[00:03:47]>> Yeah. Let's hope that when her diaries are released, which God knows when that'll happen, that she'll have things like, "Oh, and this president was my favorite president." Or, "I really didn't like this president." Maybe she didn't do that in her diaries, but we can we can hope. But you know, we Michael, we can judge what she thought by what she did. And if you judge her by what she did, you'd say her favorite president was Ronald Reagan with whom she had this huge connection over Yes.

[00:04:15]horses and >> horses. And if you wanted to say who was her least favorite president, judging by what she did, that would have to be Jimmy Carter.

[00:04:26]>> And why Jimmy Carter and what did she do?

[00:04:29]So Jimmy Carter on his first Jimmy Carter who did many wonderful things for the world during his long life. Jimmy Carter on his first trip uh abroad as president went to London, sat next to the queen at one of those incredibly fancy dinners at Buckingham Palace, was saying goodbye to the royal family. And you know, Michael, I know that you constantly encounter royalty. So you know there is a protocol rule against touching the royals, right? You do not touch the royals. Uh, so Jimmy Carter ignored that rule, leaned in to kiss the queen mother on her cheek. That would be forbidden. What's worse, she turned her head and he kissed her on the lips.

[00:05:14]This is something that she never forgot.

[00:05:17]She complained about privately. And Jimmy Carter was never invited back to the palace.

[00:05:23]>> Okay. in contrast to the the breach of protocol. And I I love the rules and in Susan's book, she details who ran a foul of them and different things that that happened. Uh for example, reviewing the troops with President Trump and them getting out of the alignment that they were supposed to be in. But the story that comes to mind from your book is the Range Rover and the Obamas and the seating arrangement. Will you tell that story?

[00:05:50]So the Obamas were the surprise friends of the queen. You know, beforehand people, officials on both sides of the Atlantic thought they might not really get along, but they did. They got along from the start. And the Obama's wanted the queen to come to Washington for a state dinner. By then she was in her 90s. She wasn't traveling. So they made a last visit to see her and at Windsor Castle. and they land in the helicopter and they get out and the plan, this carefully orchestrated plan because everything with both presidents and queens are carefully orchestrated was for President Obama to get in the backseat of the Land Rover with the Queen and for Michelle Obama to sit in the front seat with Prince Phillip who was going to drive to the consternation of the Secret Service. So Michelle Obama gets to the car and m and the queen indicates she should get in and sit next to her. And Michelle Obama is when I interviewed her, she said she was really stricken because she had been very carefully instructed to sit in the front seat, not the back seat. The queen could see her and said, "Why did they tell her? Did they tell you some deal that you had to sit you couldn't sit in the back seat?" And Michelle Obama said, "Yes." And she said, "Forget that. Come and sit with me." Because you know these royal rules that cause so much consternation in the British press when Americans defied them uh did never never seem to flumx the queen herself. She never she seemed more amused than offended when Americans went arai.

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[00:08:00]>> I know you have a lot of choices when it comes to YouTube. Please consider subscribing to this channel because it's unlike any other. Every day we're putting out great content. It might be front page newsmakers like today John Federman. It might be somebody from the arts. It might be a rock star. I'm into everything and constantly providing you with great content here on my YouTube channel. Based on my reading of of Susan Paige's book, The Queen and Her Presidents, if you had if if someone over a drink said to me, "Oh, and and based on reading the book, who do you think Queen Elizabeth II most favorite among the presidents?" I would have I would have said three names. Not necessarily equally, but three names. I would have said Ike, I would have said Reagan, and I would have said the Obamas. How am I doing in terms of your perception?

[00:08:46]You know that I think that is exactly right in in different ways for different reasons. With with Eisenhower, he was like almost a father figure. You know, he was a mentor. He had been the general who came to London when she was a teenager and helped rescue Great Britain during World War II as commander of Allied forces. Reagan as the president who was closest to a friend, rather close in age, very close in interest over horses and movies. and Obama as this like surprised guest uh and they you know you know you know Obama is not given to false praise in fact there were times when his congressional liaison people wish he would do more with false praise he doesn't do that but he said at Shimone Perez's eulogy that there were he had had the privilege to meet three giants of the 20th century and he named Shimone Perez Nelson Mandela and Queen Elizabeth that tells you what he thought of her.

[00:09:42]>> Well, I think the reveal from both sides of the pond relative to the relationship with the Obamas and the Queen, as you detail in the book, was the girls trip because Michelle ends up taking the girls and her mom and they're well, it's not an official visit. They're they're there for fun. You correct me if I'm wrong. And the girls are given a carriage ride on the grounds of Buckingham Palace.

[00:10:04]>> Oh my goodness. Can and they were little girls then. Can you imagine little girls in this wonderful ornate historic gilded uh uh being being carted around the palace grounds? Something you would uh never forget and something the Obamas appreciated. I'm sure their girls remember it too.

[00:10:24]>> Joe Kennedy, Ambassador Joseph Kennedy to the court at St. James. Interesting position that he took relative to appeasement and Hitler. And you know, now comes the sun. JFK also rising uh distinguishes himself because the book was titled what? While England slept.

[00:10:43]What am I making reference to?

[00:10:46]>> So you Joseph Kennedy of course the ambassador much reviled uh because he opposed the US coming in on the side of Great Britain uh during the war uh much to FDR FDR's uh opposition as well, the president who appointed him. Uh so his son uh when Elizabeth is 12 years old, a 12-year-old princess, his son JFK is 21 and a senior at Harvard, he comes over to see his dad at work and he has tea with the queen mother and princess Elizabeth at the palace. Uh and he writes to his friend Lim Billings afterwards that he had made a great deal of time with the princess. And I got to tell you, Michael, I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what in the world that meant. I never did. What What What would you How would you have interpreted that weird phrase in his letter?

[00:11:40]>> Oddly. Yes.

[00:11:45]>> Susan, with regard to >> Oddly, that and fun fact, that was >> Go ahead, finish.

[00:11:50]F >> fun fact, that was that was the first time she had met with a future president. JFK was the first future president she met >> relative to Reagan. In contrast, the Queen's connection with Reagan was immediate and enduring and uncomplicated. He was born to modest circumstances in smalltown Illinois. She was an heir to the British throne. But as adults, they had a better understanding than most of the roles each filled of what they required. For the British, it would mean something for them to have such a rapport, especially at a time of war. just speaking to that special affinity that they had. And there's a there's a nugget tucked in here somewhere. I guess I didn't tab it, but I know that I read it where you make reference to the Reagan library and the private quarters, which I had the privilege of touring, where the Reagans would spend time at the Reagan uh presidential library before each of their passing, but his first. And you count the number of pictures that there were in tribute to the royal family as compared to his own. What am I speaking of?

[00:12:55]So, in this apartment, uh, there are more pictures, s these beautiful silver frame pictures of the royal family than of Reagan's own children. Uh, and, uh, you know, make of make of that uh, what you will. They they did have this great connection. The other thing I saw in the Reagan library were these letters they exchanged, the Queen and President Reagan, after he left the White House, and she didn't keep up a correspondence with every president. And these letters are full of talk about horses, >> right? Well, the death of >> I wrote my horse.

[00:13:28]>> Yeah. He he he wrote >> the death of her horse and he wrote this this beautiful condolence letter.

[00:13:36]>> Yes. Which she then acknowledged. Uh so that that you know that tells you something when after all those years and he's no longer in power. So she's no longer kind of cultivating a relationship with him to have exchanges of letters like that. It was really uh quite poignant.

[00:13:52]>> Okay, I promise I'm not giving it all away for free. The book is called The Queen and Her President. Susan Paige is the author, but I don't know. This nugget just I thought it was funny and weird. So, the Queen comes with Philip with the Duke of Edinburgh and they're in San Francisco. They're making a visit to the United States and she's excited, the Queen, Queen Elizabeth, because of the prospect of eating at a restaurant.

[00:14:15]And as you write, it was the first time she had eaten in a restaurant in 17 years.

[00:14:24]>> And you know the other the so it was uh Trader Vicks.

[00:14:28]>> Trader Vick the >> Yeah.

[00:14:30]>> Trader Vicks, the famous kind of Polynesian restaurant in San Francisco.

[00:14:34]The other thing that was fun about that was so she was very excited to go to the restaurant they did. They gave them fortune cookies at the end of the meal.

[00:14:41]She opens up her fortune cookie and reads the fortune and then tucks it in that tiny purse that she took everywhere.

[00:14:48]>> I love that. I freaking love that.

[00:14:50]Couldn't you find that fortune cookie message in the the archives somewhere?

[00:14:55]>> Oh, I wish. Let's hope the Windsor archives someday are thrown open and we can find things like that.

[00:15:00]>> Okay, two two final things for Susan Page. Number one, because obviously a lot of research went into this and those presidential and first lady and prime minister interviews. What's the coolest place you found yourself doing research for this book?

[00:15:18]>> Absolutely. The coolest place was I was at Westminster interviewing a member of Parliament and he said, "Would you like to go to the bar?" And it turns out that in Parliament they have these three bars tucked away so that members of the par parliament can go there and have a drink uh even while proceedings are going on.

[00:15:38]uh uh on the floor and that is something that you do not see at the US Congress.

[00:15:43]>> I love that. And they they mingle. It's a good thing. We need that. And then finally, I just have to say the way in which at the end you kind of did the weave except you really brought it to a conclusion and you described her as being London's bridge. That was awesome.

[00:16:00]>> Expand on that and I'll let you go.

[00:16:03]>> So, Michael, that was the original title of the book. That's what I proposed to be the title of the book. And my my editor said, "Oh, no, that's not that's a terrible title. It has to have crown or queen in the title." I said, "Okay."

[00:16:14]I but but I saved it for the chapter heading of the last chapter because that's what she was. She was a huge, useful, important, consequential bridge between the United States and the United Kingdom for 70 years.

[00:16:29]>> Book's awesome. You You are worth waiting a year for. So, thank you so so much, Susan. I wish you good things with the book.

[00:16:36]Thank you so much.

[00:16:37]>> Susan Paige is, as I mentioned, she is the Washington bureau chief of USA Today. She writes about politics and the White House. And the new book is awesome and it's called The Queen and Her Presidents. You'll love it.

[00:16:49]>> This on one side and this on the other side.

[00:16:55]>> But all you really want is this.