Trump lawyer Robert Garson told the Telegraph he discussed refuge for those leaving UK over antisemitism<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Discussions are reportedly under way within Donald Trump<\/a>\u2019s administration about the US possibly granting asylum to Jewish people from the UK, according to the Telegraph<\/a>, citing the US president\u2019s personal lawyer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump lawyer Robert Garson told the newspaper that he has held conversations with the US state department about offering refuge to British Jews who are leaving the UK citing rising antisemitism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Guardian.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Garson, 49, said he felt the UK was \u201cno longer a safe place for Jews\u201d. He added that recent events \u2013 namely an Islamist attack on a synagogue<\/a> in Manchester and what he described as widespread<\/a> antisemitism<\/a> following the Hamas attack on Israel on 7 October 2023 \u2013 had led him to believe that British Jews should be given the option of sanctuary in the US.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some supporters of Israel<\/a> in the UK cast mass demonstrations there against the Israeli response to the 2023 attack, in which tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians were killed in Gaza, as motivated by antisemitism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In a US television interview<\/a> in late 2023, Garson himself called protesters in New York and Los Angeles who opposed the Israeli response \u201cmarauding mobs\u201d and accused them of \u201cmasquerading as protesters\u201d to shout \u201cantisemitic chants baying for Jewish blood\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the new interview with the Telegraph, Garson said he could see \u201cno future\u201d for Jews in the UK and placed much of the responsibility on to British prime minister Keir Starmer, accusing him of allowing antisemitism to grow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Garson, a former British barrister who practiced in London before relocating to the US in 2008, told the Telegraph: \u201cThe UK is no longer a safe place for Jews. I have spoken to the state department as to whether the president should be offering British Jews asylum in the US.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n He went on to say that such a proposition is attractive because \u201cit is a highly educated community\u201d. \u201cIt is a populous that speaks English natively, that is educated and doesn\u2019t have a high proportion of criminals,\u201d Garson said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He added: \u201cWhen I look at what is going on with Jews in Britain, and when I look at the changing demographics, I don\u2019t believe \u2013 and I have discussed this with people in the Trump administration<\/a> \u2013 that there is a future for Jews in the United Kingdom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFor me, that is particularly sad.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Garson said he raised the idea of the US acting as a refuge for British Jews with Trump\u2019s special envoy to monitor and combat antisemitism, Yehuda Kaploun, in his role as a board member of the US Holocaust Memorial Council. Trump appointed Garson to the council in May after dismissing board members who had been appointed during Joe Biden\u2019s presidency.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Trump previously hired Garson to pursue a $50m lawsuit<\/a> against investigative journalist Bob Woodward that was dismissed<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n A 2025 survey conducted by the Institute for Jewish Policy Research found that feelings of safety in the UK\u2019s Jewish community have declined sharply<\/a> in recent years. It found 35% of Jews felt unsafe in Britain in 2025, compared with 9% in 2023 before the Hamas attacks and the protests in Britain against the Israeli assault on Gaza.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Perceptions of antisemitism had also intensified, with 47% of British Jews seeing it as a \u201cvery big\u201d problem \u2013 up from just 11% in 2012.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In October, the Trump administration had announced<\/a> that it planned to restrict the number of refugees it admits into the US in 2026 to just 7,500 \u2013 and those spots would be mostly reserved for white South Africans<\/a>. It wasn\u2019t immediately clear how British Jews would factor into that figure should the US grant them refuge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n