US ambassador sacked after Epstein emails

• Read in full: Costly embassy revamp ‘puts UK on the map’ in Washington

Mandelson has fallen victim to his “fatal attraction” to rich people, a former special adviser to Alistair Darling suggested.

Catherine Macleod told Times Radio: “He manages to work his way around people with influence and contacts. He’s always been drawn to people in power and I spoke to a friend of his last night and said this is what’s going to get Peter again. It is his fatal attraction to rich people that has plagued him throughout his political life. “

Labour’s former deputy leader has said it was “shameful” that Mandelson had not resigned over his links to Epstein.

Baroness Harman said it was right for Starmer to have sacked Mandelson adding that she wished that he had never appointed him in the first place.

She told Sky News’ Electoral Dysfunction podcast: “It’s been a horrible, awful episode. It’s shameful that Peter Mandelson didn’t resign in the national interest and in the interest of the government, but he’s not that sort of person. So it was right that Keir Starmer sacked him.”

Starmer found Mandelson’s emails to Epstein “reprehensible”, Downing Street has said.

Asked if the prime minister shared the view of two ministers who said they were disgusted and sickened by the messages, Starmer’s spokesman said: “I think it’s self-evident that he found the content of these emails reprehensible.”

Asked what aspect Starmer found reprehensible, he said the depth and extent of the relationship shown in the emails was “new information”.

“And they show that Peter Mandelson suggested that Jeffrey Epstein’s first conviction was wrongful, should be challenged — that is why he’s been withdrawn as ambassador with immediate effect.”

James Roscoe, Mandelson’s deputy in the Washington embassy, is to take over his role and help to organise Trump’s state visit to the UK.

Roscoe, who took up his current role in 2022, is a Whitehall veteran who has worked in both Downing Street and the Royal Household — as the Queen’s communication’s secretary.

The prime minister’s spokesman described him as a “hugely experienced diplomat” who would take on the role on an interim visit. His job will be to liaise with the Royal Household, Downing Street and the White House over details of the trip and smooth over any problems.

Roscoe began his career in the Foreign Office before being seconded to Downing Street as chief press officer for Sir Tony Blair and Gordon Brown between 2006 and 2009. He moved to the Royal Household before returning to Whitehall in 2016 as director of communication in the Cabinet Office, and the Department for Exiting the European Union.

A minister who was sacked from the government just days ago has called Mandelson’s departure the “best sacking of the week”.

Justin Madders was removed from his employment minister role at the weekend.

Analysis by Patrick Maguire

The departure of Mandelson is a complete, unmitigated disaster for Starmer.

In six days the prime minister has lost his deputy, Angela Rayner, to scandal, and now his US ambassador, leaving more than a whiff of what all distrustful voters suspect to be the stuff of political service: financial chicanery, dishonesty, and too close an acquaintance with depravity.

For a leader who made so much of his own probity — and insistence on high standards in public life — sacking Mandelson will surely do little to restore public confidence. No 10 is inundated with questions about what Starmer knew, and when — and why he burnt through his overdraft of political capital defending Mandelson at the dispatch box yesterday.

All in all — to borrow an infamous line from legal history with which Starmer will no doubt be familiar — it is an appalling vista for the government to reckon with. The already fraught politics of next week’s state visit by President Trump now look impossible and Downing Street can no longer rely on its wiliest operator to navigate them.

Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, has suggested that Starmer might offer him the post of US ambassador after the sacking of Mandelson.

Farage told Talk TV: “If I was Starmer, I would offer it to me, because if I accepted it, it would get me out of the way, wouldn’t it?”

Asked if he would accept the post, Farage added: “I don’t think they would offer the job to me, but I have to say, [the embassy] is a rather lovely building.”

Sir Ed Davey has said that the government should appoint an ambassador who will “stand up to Trump”.

The Liberal Democrat leader added Starmer should “come before parliament and explain why Lord Mandelson was appointed in the first place, given everything the government knew then”.

Kemi Badenoch, the Tory leader, said: “Mandelson might have gone but, just as with Angela Rayner, Starmer dithered when he needed to be decisive. Time and again he puts party above country. He has no backbone and no convictions.”

Emily Thornberry, the Labour MP who dropped out of the race for the party’s deputy leadership this morning, has said “it is right” that Mandelson “has now been sacked”.

Thornberry, who is the chair of the Commons foreign affairs committee, said: “Since the first rumours of his appointment, my committee has repeatedly asked, publicly and privately, to question Peter Mandelson. The FCDO [Foreign Office] should not have stopped us from asking questions.”

Baroness Morgan of Huyton, the former political secretary to Tony Blair, told the How To Win An Election podcast that she suspected Starmer did know the “full package” about Mandelson’s friendship with Epstein.

“The thing with Peter is Peter’s brilliant. Peter is brilliant and he was a fantastic minister. The sad thing is, I think he was also a really, really good ambassador for the UK. But there’s the other side of Peter that comes and haunts him and it’s Peter’s own judgment about Peter which is, I’m afraid, the thing that is always his downfall,” she told the Times Radio podcast.

“And I guess that’s what’s happened here is it’s his past catching up with him. But I do think for the UK, it’s actually really unfortunate.”

Daniel Finkelstein, The Times columnist, has said Mandelson’s connection with Epstein was “bound to” lead to difficulties for Starmer.

“I thought that his appointment was the appointment of a very sharp, intelligent, insightful person. And I think therefore he was going to be a very good ambassador”, he said on Times Radio’s How to Win an Election podcast, which the former ambassador used to host.

“I did always worry about this Epstein issue because I didn’t think it would go away. And obviously it was known that Peter knew Epstein. So I did worry about that. I must admit, I assumed that both he and Downing Street had gone into it in some detail and convinced themselves that it wouldn’t develop in the way that it has. The last 24 hours, I’ve reached the conclusion that this was almost bound to happen.

“I do feel really sorry for Peter because he’d be a very capable ambassador. On the other hand, he clearly made quite a big mistake, odd completely to fathom, with his relationship with Epstein.”

Mandelson and Epstein discussed a meeting between Gordon Brown, then prime minister, and George W Bush, then president.

In one cryptic exchange, Epstein wrote: “Your boy is meeting tomorrow with B. If he gets a chance he could remind Josh Bolton [Bush’s chief of staff at the time].”

A spokesman for Bush said he never discussed Epstein while in office. Bolton said he had “no recollection of anyone ever raising Jeffrey Epstein’s case with him, nor, to his knowledge, with President Bush”.

In May 2006, police in Florida filed a probable cause affidavit saying Epstein should be charged with four counts of unlawful sexual activity with a minor and one count of lewd and lascivious molestation. One of the alleged victims was 14 years old.

Later that month, Mandelson messaged him saying: “I am following you closely and here whenever you need.”

The next month, he wrote again to say: “Worried that I haven’t heard from you. Are you seeing them off and winning?”

On the day that Epstein was arrested and charged, Mandelson wrote: “Keep me posted. Where are you next week?”

Emails between Mandelson and Epstein, which were published on Wednesday by Bloomberg, revealed how his relationship with the disgraced financier continued long after allegations against him first arose in 2006.

In an email sent the day before the paedophile financier began an 18-month prison sentence for soliciting sex from a minor, Mandelson wrote to Epstein to say that his “friends stay with you and love you”.

“I think the world of you and I feel hopeless and furious about what has happened,” he wrote in June 2008. “I can still barely understand it. It just could not happen in Britain.

“You have to be incredibly resilient, fight for early release and be philosophical about it as much as you can. The whole thing has been years of torture and now you have to show the world how big a person you are, and how strong. Your friends stay with you and love you.”

Lord Mandelson’s position has become increasingly untenable over recent days.

On Monday, the US House oversight committee published a book given to Jeffrey Epstein by friends for his 50th birthday. The book included ten pages from Mandelson, who called Epstein his “best pal”.
The response from Mandelson on Tuesday was that he regretted the association with Epstein.

HOUSE OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE

On Wednesday morning, the US ambassador went further with his apology but said further “embarrassing” exchanges would emerge.

At prime minister’s questions at noon, Sir Keir Starmer insisted he had confidence in Mandelson.

In the afternoon, The Sun published emails sent by Mandelson to Epstein after his conviction urging him to fight for early release.

This proved the final straw for Starmer. Ministers on Thursday morning said they were “disgusted” by the newest emails and would not guarantee Mandelson’s future. Then, shortly before 11am, the Foreign Office confirmed he had been sacked.

The government has insisted that Lord Mandelson was subject to “robust security clearances and processes” before his appointment.

Stephen Doughty, the Foreign Office minister, said Epstein was a “despicable criminal who committed the most heinous crimes and destroyed the lives of so many women”.

Mandelson’s position had become increasingly untenable, with ministers refusing to back him on the broadcast rounds this morning.

Mike Tapp, a Home Office minister, told the BBC he was “really disturbed by those emails [to Epstein]” and that they made him “shudder”. “It leaves a bad taste in the mouth,” he said.

Tapp admitted the issue was an “unhelpful distraction” ahead of President Trump’s visit to the UK next week.

Asked by Stig Abell on Times Radio whether he should remain in position, Tapp said: “I have to refer you to the statement that Peter Mandelson has made yesterday and been really clear around his regret.”

Lord Mandelson’s sacking as ambassador comes just days before President Trump’s state visit to the UK.

The Times revealed on Wednesday that officials blocked the release of a secret memo in which Mandelson urged Sir Tony Blair to meet Epstein while he was prime minister. A National Archives release of the 2002 memo was halted over fears it might embarrass Britain and damage relations with the US.

The prime minister faced questions over his judgment after insisting that the ambassador was “playing an important role in the US-UK relationship”. He said that “due process was followed” when he appointed Mandelson last year but refused to publish any information about how he was vetted for the role.

Peter Mandelson shopping with Jeffrey Epstein in 2005 in Saint Barthelemy

In a statement announcing Mandelson’s sacking the British embassy in Washington said: “In light of the additional information in emails written by Peter Mandelson, the prime minister has asked the foreign secretary to withdraw him as ambassador.

“The emails show that the depth and extent of Peter Mandelson’s relationship with Jeffrey Epstein is materially different from that known at the time of his appointment.

“In particular Peter Mandelson’s suggestion that Jeffrey Epstein’s first conviction was wrongful and should be challenged is new information. In light of that, and mindful of the victims of Epstein’s crimes he has been withdrawn as ambassador with immediate effect.”

Stephen Doughty, the minister of state announced the sacking

Sir Keir Starmer has sacked Lord Mandelson as ambassador to the US after further revelations about his relationship with the convicted paedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

On Wednesday the prime minister said he had full confidence in Mandelson after a day in which the ambassador expressed regret over his association with Epstein but faced intensifying questions about the extent of his dealings with him.

Leaked emails showed that Mandelson told Epstein in 2008 that he should “fight for early release” as he was awaiting sentence for a child sex offence.