Britain is bracing itself for US president Donald Trump’s arrival as he embarks on an “unprecedented” second state visit to the UK this week.

We asked people in London’s Soho Square how he would fare if he swapped the White House for 10 Downing Street.

Mia: Not good, I would say, considering how badly it’s going over there. I would hope that the British spirit would kind of counter that. I feel like we’re a very resilient people and a very strong people. There’s a reason we have a lot of punks here!

So I would hope that if he did get into power, he would not last long. I don’t think it would go very well. But then we’re not doing great here either, so who knows?

Julia: We’d all have to emigrate somewhere else.

I don’t agree with so many of his views. I think he comes from such a strong point where it’s harming people. Obviously, we’ve seen the ICE raids, we’ve seen how many people are being moved around and how much damage that is causing right now. I personally really care about people. So I think some of the issues that he’s coming down on strongly to do with the LGBTQ community, women’s rights, but also immigration rights.

It’s very sad. And I actually think we are moving backwards (rather) than moving forwards in 2025.

Dan: Oh, Jesus Christ. Not good. He’s doing a really good job at making America awful again. So I feel like the UK would probably go down a pretty slippery hole too…That’s the Donald Trump effect.

I think he just incites fear so well in people. So he always seems to find a way to tap into that with people. So I think he’d find that here and just drive it home, as they always tend to.

Jessica: Gosh, it would be a disaster, I would say. I don’t think they would have allowed that to happen though.

Well, I’m talking for Ireland anyway. I don’t think we would have allowed that to happen, but I do think there would be a lot more issues and a lot more like riots and things like that.

Mieko: I’m not sure. Maybe it would be more business-like here. I think it’s a little bit more socialism here. But if he comes I think it would be less on the socialism side and then it would be much, much, much more businesslike.

He’d change the employment system, employment law. Well, get rid of it, modify it.

Wafi: Scary. Very scary. Everything that he stands for is so extreme. And it doesn’t cater to everyone as just tailored towards a very small, specific group of people that are going to benefit from what he stands for, and most of us will suffer, if that makes sense.

Julie: Absolutely horrific. It would just bring the horror that’s happening in the US to here, it would be terrible.

I’m from the US and I voted for Biden/Harris in the last election. And so many of us Americans are all devastated with what Trump is doing.

Ben: A whole big mess and a nation that most other nations would hate, I guess. I think it would be a whole mess: homophobic, racist, conservative. This is what it would look like, I think. I’m not saying it’s not the case (here already), but this would be much worse.

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Bridget: Oh, we’d have the usual buy into fascism. We would have the sycophants making money. We would have him labeling what he doesn’t like as bad as we have with Bolsanaro in Brazil, he tried an insurrection with which I think Trump identifies. So we have, for example, his friends in Palantir who, while taking NHS data and benefiting from it, says that all British people have Stockholm syndrome with respect to NHS data and to the NHS as a structure, despite the fact that so many people in America, break themselves on health costs and it’s the commonest cause of bankruptcy in America.

Fatou: Oh my God. I think that it would be less open to me. London and the UK in general is very open minded. You can do whatever you want and be whoever you want to be. I think that if Trump comes here, it’s going to be very hard for people to be themselves.

Frank: Not a lot different. I don’t think he would affect an already established way of life in England. I don’t think it’d change much.

(What does that say about the current government?) Not a lot at all.

Anastasia: Personally, as a French person, I think there would be a lot of protest (if it happened in France) just because we don’t really like him. The French view of the world and Donald Trump’s view of the world collide. I think he’s a bit too much. So I don’t think it would be a good thing.

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What would Britain be like with Donald Trump as prime minister?