Britain’s ambassador to the United States, Peter Mandelson, speaks during a welcome reception for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer at the ambassador’s residence on Feb. 26 in Washington, D.C. Carl Court/Pool Getty Images hide caption
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LONDON — Days before President Trump arrives in the United Kingdom for a state visit, the U.K. has fired its ambassador to Washington over links to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
In 2008, before becoming ambassador to the United States, Peter Mandelson — a former Cabinet minister and European Union trade commissioner from the center-left Labour Party — wrote Epstein an email saying, “I think the world of you and I feel hopeless and furious about what has happened.”
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In another, he wrote: “Your friends stay with you and love you.”
Mandelson’s emails, published Wednesday by The Sun newspaper, were sent after Epstein was indicted by a grand jury in 2006. The New York financier pleaded guilty two years later to soliciting sex with a minor.
On Thursday, U.K. Foreign Office minister Stephen Doughty told Parliament that Prime Minister Keir Starmer was withdrawing Mandelson as ambassador — effective immediately.
The Foreign Office says the emails show the extent of Mandelson’s relationship with the late sex offender was “materially different” from what was known at the time he was appointed as ambassador. It singled out one of his emails in which Mandelson lamented Epstein’s conviction, calling it wrongful and suggesting it should be challenged.
Mandelson is known in U.K. politics as a behind-the-scenes spin doctor who played a significant role in the 1997 election of Prime Minister Tony Blair, earning the nickname “Prince of Darkness.”
In 2001, after resigning in scandal from Blair’s government and then winning reelection to Parliament, he famously called himself a “fighter … not a quitter.” (The scandal involved allegations that Mandelson helped an Indian billionaire get a British passport; an official inquiry cleared him of any wrongdoing.)
His firing as ambassador complicates Starmer’s efforts to build rapport with the Trump administration, and it comes as the U.S. president prepares to travel Tuesday to the U.K. for a state visit.
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Photos have also emerged of Mandelson in a bathrobe at Epstein’s home. And in an infamous Epstein birthday book — which includes a drawing of a woman’s body that President Trump denies penning — there’s also a handwritten message from Mandelson, calling Epstein his “best pal.”
In a TV interview Wednesday, before his firing, Mandelson said he now sees Epstein as “a charismatic criminal liar” who has become “an albatross around my neck.”
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“I regret very much that I fell for his lies,” he said.
The decision to fire Mandelson came less than 24 hours after Starmer told Parliament he had confidence in his U.S. envoy, who had served in the position for seven months. Opposition politicians called the revelations about Mandelson “sickening” and accused Starmer of poor judgment in keeping him in the role for so long.
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Mandelson will be replaced by his deputy, James Roscoe, a veteran diplomat and former communications chief to the late Queen Elizabeth II. He will oversee Trump’s state visit with King Charles III next week.
