Johnson referred to Yale as a place of “intellectual freedom,” and defended Israel’s “legitimate attempts” to destroy Hamas.
Will Coen
Staff Writer, The Buckley Beacon
On Thursday evening, the Buckley Institute and Young America’s Foundation (YAF) co-hosted former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom Boris Johnson for a lecture titled, “The U.S. and U.K.: A Special Alliance that Must Work Together to Save the West.” Johnson’s visit is part of YAF’s Irving Brown Lecture Series.
Johnson was first elected to the British Parliament in 1997, and was later the mayor of London from 2008 to 2016, and Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs from 2016 to 2018. Before entering politics, Johnson worked as a journalist. Johnson served as prime minister and leader of the Conservative Party from 2019 to 2022, where he delivered Brexit, the U.K.’s exit from the European Union, and oversaw the nation’s controversial response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Johnson began by discussing the October 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas, and claimed that anti-Israel protesters were supportive of Hamas.
“These people were protesting against Israel’s legitimate attempts to stop such a massacre from occurring again,” he told the crowd of roughly 380 attendees. “These crowds proclaiming their hatred of the only democracy in the Middle East, when Hamas is an Islamofascist death cult that has for years been armed and funded by Iran to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars.”
Johnson connected the October 7 massacre, and its alleged backing by Iran, to the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine. “Iran is in long-term strategic alliance with Putin’s Russia that is using North Korean manpower and massive Chinese economic and technical support to try to obliterate another democracy in Ukraine.” He also took a shot at right-wing French politician Marine Le Pen, who “thinks that Putin is a defender of Western civilization.”
Le Pen has previously denied ties to Putin, and disapproved of his 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
Johnson also expressed his support for President Donald Trump, and criticized those who compare Trump’s treatment of journalists with that of other world leaders. “You would think by listening to the liberal media around the world that Trump’s gentle ribbing, irreverent treatment of the media was on par with what the authorities are doing in Iran or China or North Korea. … There are many, many countries around the world where there is no free media at all. And we continue to have this narcissistic argument about what’s going on in the west.”
Johnson also spoke about his attendance at President Trump’s inauguration in January, including private conversations he had with Jeff Bezos and his wife, Lauren Sánchez Bezos.
“Jeff told me about what it was like when [Amazon] began. He was literally sitting on the floor of his garage, packing the books himself.” Johnson later praised American entrepreneurs, including Bezos, Elon Musk, and Tim Cook, as having turned their “ideas” into “world, civilization changing businesses.”
Johnson was later asked to provide one lesson that the U.S. should take from British history. Johnson alluded to the achievements of the British Empire that were secured with “unpromising materials,” and advised Americans to consider what they can achieve with their own resources.
“I think the lesson to be learned from the UK, from British history, for Americans, is look at the scale of what the Brits did just in the period they had out of a tiny island on the northwest coast of Europe, not particularly well-favored with climate or natural resources,” he said. “I think the lesson I would urge you to draw is confidence about America. And I just sometimes feel that that’s lacking.”
On November 5, the Buckley Institute will host British author and journalist Douglas Murray for a similar conversation on the future of Western democracies.