Politics
What Personal Trainers Wish Every Gymgoer Understood
Whether you’re a first-timer who’s barely touched a free weight or a seasoned regular who’s been hitting the same machines for years, you can still learn a lot from personal trainers.
HuffPost asked fitness professionals across the country what they wish more gymgoers understood about exercise. Their answers might just change the way you work out.
1. Consistency beats perfection every single time
“I wish people knew that consistency beats perfection every time,” Thomas Banicky, senior district fitness manager at 24 Hour Fitness, told HuffPost.
“You do not need a flawless workout plan or a two-hour gym session to make meaningful progress. Showing up regularly, building sustainable habits and focusing on gradual improvement will almost always lead to better long-term results than trying to do everything perfectly for a few weeks and burning out.”
You don’t need to overcomplicate your workouts or pressure yourself to make the “perfect” program.
“Fitness isn’t all-or-nothing,” said Denise Chakoian, a certified fitness trainer and owner of Core Cycle and Fitness LaGree.
“Too many people think that if they can’t exercise for an hour, six days a week, then they shouldn’t exercise at all. That’s simply not the case. Consistency will always trump perfection – 20 to 30 minutes of movement is better than none at all and can have huge benefits for your health.”
“The people making real progress are rarely the loudest ones in the room,” echoed April Medrano, vice president of programming, education and experience at STRIDE Fitness.
“What I wish more people understood is that progress is built in the unglamorous middle. Everyone wants the transformation, but the magic is in the boring repetition – the same lift, the same habits, the same showing up week after week.”
2. Results take months and years, not days and weeks
“Good things take time,” said Mallory Fox, a National Academy of Sports Medicine master trainer and wellness coach.
“Clients often have unrealistic expectations about the time required to meet their goals. While everyone’s progress is different, a good rule of thumb I like to share is that they’ll start to feel results in the first four weeks and see results in the first four months.”
While that timeline might feel slow and discouraging, it sets a realistic standard that promotes consistency, sustainability and injury prevention.
“We live in a society of instant gratification, but your body doesn’t work that way,” Chakoian said. “If you want to see changes in your strength, body composition and overall health, it’s going to take months and years of consistency, not days or weeks.”
Fitness isn’t about punishing your body. It’s about building a body that serves you well for decades.
– Karen Lord, trainer
Certified personal trainer Josh Schlottman recommended tracking long-term data over short-term dopamine hits. Progressive overload over time is key.
“Humans are naturally inclined to chase sensations like the pump, the burn, the sweat and the soreness,” he said.
“But I wish people understood that muscle soreness correlates very poorly with muscle growth. Soreness is mostly just a sign that your body went through some novel stimulus, but not necessarily that you had an optimal workout. If you’re not adding weight to the bar or doing more reps over time, then you’re not building strength or muscle.”
3. The hardest workout is not always the most effective
“One thing I wish more people understood is that the hardest workout is not always the most effective workout,” said Antonietta Vicario, chief training officer at PVOLVE.
“A lot of people chase a completely depleted feeling, but if you do not have the mobility, stability and core control to support intensity in movements, your body will find ways to compensate.”
Rather than setting unrealistic and counterproductive goals, she recommended starting modestly to gauge where your body is with a particular exercise and then adding incrementally as you build tolerance over time. The goal is not to wipe yourself out every time you exercise.
“Fitness isn’t about punishing your body,” said trainer and Karen Lord Pilates founder Karen Lord.
“It’s about building a body that serves you well for decades. If your workout leaves you feeling stronger, moving better, and looking forward to coming back tomorrow, that’s a much better measure of success than simply leaving completely exhausted.”
Be mindful of form and technique. Don’t push through sharp pains or clear signs of overtraining for the sake of a more intense or longer workout, either. Understand the difference between the soreness and discomfort from working out and the acute, stabbing pains that signal something is wrong.
FG Trade via Getty Images
4. What happens outside the gym matters as much as what happens inside it
“Your lifestyle influences your gains just as much as your workouts,” Schlottman said. “Psychological stress can literally double the time it takes for your body to recover from a workout and can also double your injury risk. Sleep deprivation also deteriorates nutrient partitioning. This means you’ll lose more muscle and keep more fat while dieting. Fitness is really a lifestyle, and you can’t out-train chronic stress or sleep deprivation.”
Exercise alone won’t help you reach your fitness goals without proper nutrition, stress management, rest and other healthy habits outside the gym.
“I wish more people understood how much the small things matter,” said WalkFit certified personal trainer David J. Sautter.
“Many gym-goers focus entirely on their workouts, but factors like daily movement, sleep, hydration and recovery all play a huge role in the results you see. Even something as simple as walking more each day is often underrated, despite the wide range of physical and mental health benefits it provides.”
5. Nobody is watching you as closely as you think
“Many people avoid the gym because they’re worried about being judged. In reality, most people are focused on their own workout, and trainers are usually excited to see someone taking a step toward improving their health,” said certified personal trainer Tara De Leon.
“Gymtimidation” is a real thing. But try to remember everyone was a beginner once, and people are usually too absorbed in their own workouts at the gym to scrutinise yours.
“People are far more focused on their own workout than on anyone else’s,” said Kat Pasle-Green, a health and fitness coach with Bay Club. “Walking into a gym can feel intimidating for some, but people respect consistency and genuine effort over perfection. Everyone starts somewhere, and we get better together.”
Try to resist the urge to compare yourself to others as well. Remember, everyone has a different body, different experience level and different goals. That’s why there’s no one-size-fits-all approach to fitness.
6. Don’t assume everyone is there to lose weight
“I would never assume someone’s goal is weight loss,” De Leon said. “People come to the gym for so many reasons – stress relief, strength, community, injury recovery, mental health and fun, just to name a few. No matter what their body size is, leading with a weight-loss assumption is often reductive and alienating, especially for women.”
She recalled a client who was battling cancer and had lost a significant amount of weight, but people would approach her asking what her weight loss secret was.
“She always replied, ‘Cancer! I’m dying. I’d rather be fat and alive though.’ You just never know what other people are going through, so assuming [you know] their goals isn’t a good idea,” De Leon said.
PixelsEffect via Getty Images
Fitness is about more than looks – working out builds muscle, promotes longevity, boosts confidence, improves quality of life, helps with heart and brain health, prevents injuries and so much more. Everyone at the gym has a different story and reason for being there, and all you can see is that they’re putting in the work.
“The person struggling through their workout may be fighting something you’ll never know about,” said Joshua King, training lead at Life Time Gainesville.
“The person who’s overweight may have already lost 80 pounds. The older adult lifting weights may not be training to look better, but they’re training to stay strong, independent and able to play with their grandkids for years to come.”
7. Basic gym etiquette goes a long way
Kelsey Holgate, a personal training leader and nutrition lead at Life Time Savage, said you should always “wipe down equipment after visible sweat is on the machine. It grosses people out and is not hygienic”.
Basic gym etiquette is pretty simple, and it goes a long way.
“Leave equipment cleaner than you found it,” King advised. “It’s a simple way to respect the next person. Re-rack your weights. It’s basic respect and gym etiquette.”
Skipping these steps is both inconsiderate and unsafe. Being a responsible gymgoer requires being aware that you’re in a shared space. Resist the urge to spend more time on your phone than you do actually training as well.
“I’d never hog equipment between sets while scrolling my phone,” Medrano said. “If someone’s waiting, I let them work in. The gym is shared space, and rest periods don’t require a screen.”
8. Never skip the warm-up and recovery
“I would never go into a workout without warming up,” Holgate said. “When I say warming up, I’m not talking cardio. I’m talking about movement patterns that help activate the muscles that you’re about to train. You are more likely to get injured or recruit the wrong muscle groups.”
Warm-ups help us get into the right mindset, promote mobility and support the nervous system as we embark on exercises like heavy lifting or high-intensity training – leading to improved performance. Similarly, recovery is crucial.
“One thing I wish more people understood is that recovery is productive,” Banicky said. “Many gym-goers feel guilty when they take a rest day or spend time on mobility and recovery work, but that is often where adaptation happens. Muscles do not get stronger during the workout. They get stronger when the body repairs and rebuilds afterward.”
9. It’s OK – and even smart – to ask for help
“I would recommend everyone to meet with a trainer to learn proper movement patterns,” Holgate said. “I also think meeting with a trainer helps individuals learn proper use of the equipment. It also gives them more confidence when they are in the gym vs. just roaming around.”
Even just a handful of sessions with a fitness professional can help you gain essential knowledge and skills to train effectively for life. They’ll help you learn proper form and movement to maximize safety and results. A trainer can also help you determine the best individual program for your specific needs and limitations.
“Two people can have the same goal and require completely different approaches based on their experience, lifestyle, schedule, mobility and recovery capacity,” Banicky said.
There are many considerations around biomechanics, progression and individual priorities. Working with a pro and studying fitness best practices can also help you figure out when and how to switch up your exercises to challenge yourself and see results.
“I wish more people knew it’s OK to ask for help,” Medrano said. “Most of us in this industry got into it because we genuinely want to see you win. There’s no shame in not knowing something. The only mistake is letting that stop you from starting.”
BERLIN — As the World Cup comes to a close, there’s one group of politicians who’ve remained unusually quiet about the fate of their own national teams: Europe’s far-right party leaders.
Top officials from France’s National Rally, the Alternative for Germany, England’s Reform UK and others faced complicated dynamics in deciding how to talk about the World Cup. The broad, socially acceptable form of patriotism inspired by international sporting events like the World Cup seems at first glance like an easy fit for parties whose core message includes a return to strong national pride.
But in many of the countries where these parties are growing, increasingly diverse teams with immigrant backgrounds are at odds with the way these parties think about national identity — making it tougher for them to vocally support the home team without implicitly supporting the individual players who are part of it.
“For the right, for whom national identification and identity has always been more salient than for the center and the left, soccer fandom was a natural conduit to express its passion and commitment,” said Andrei S. Markovits, a professor at the University of Michigan who studies the intersection of sports and nationalism. “This has become a tad more difficult when the players hail from multicultural backgrounds, many of which the right sees as inferior.”
(Former Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy learned the hard way how people react when someone points out those multicultural backgrounds: The center-right pol came under fire for saying ahead of Spain’s semifinal match against France that the French national team was “without Frenchmen,” a not-so-subtle dig at the African origins of many of the team’s star players.)
“It would not be good in terms of their electoral strength for [far-right parties] to be critical of these teams,” said Alan Bairner, a professor at England’s Loughborough University who has researched sports and national identity. “But the fact that they might seem a bit lukewarm is in itself a telling thing.”
That’s perhaps why criticism from far-right leaders has been directed not at their own teams, but at other teams — or at using the tournament to chime in with nationalist narratives that serve their own purposes.
Geert Wilders, leader of the Netherlands’ far-right Freedom Party, posted an image of himself in a bright-orange suit to cheer on the Dutch team in the early stages of the World Cup. It was a sharp contrast with his comments a day earlier, when he’d reposted a picture of members of the Moroccan squad praying on the field with an anti-Islam insult as the caption. (Several players of Dutch-Moroccan origin opted to play for Morocco, rather than the Netherlands this year.)
And after the Netherlands lost to Morocco in a penalty shootout late last month and post-game celebrations led to clashes with police in The Hague, Wilders — long a vocal supporter of stricter immigration controls in Europe — used the occasion to call for the deportation of all Moroccans involved in the clashes.
Reform UK’s Nigel Farage, too, used England’s semifinal match against Argentina on Wednesday to hearken back to the two countries’ 1980s-era war over the Falkland Islands: “Let’s do it all over again just like 1982,” he posted on X.
(Farage got in trouble earlier in the tournament for posting a photo of himself celebrating an England win by chugging a pint in a Three Lions jersey … only for observers to note it was a picture from the 2024 Euros.)
But in most cases, far-right leaders have swallowed their criticism of their diverse national teams and offered the basic messages of support expected of them, or in some cases, just stayed quiet.
National Rally leader Jordan Bardella, despite his past jabs at French striker Kylian Mbappé, congratulated the French team on a good run after losing to Spain earlier this week and said they “thrilled an entire nation” with their World Cup performance.
And AfD leaders Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla sought to downplay criticism of the German team’s diversity from within their party: Asked about one AfD state-level politician’s assertion that Germany’s national squad “has lost the quality of an authentic German national team” due to its diverse roster, both Weidel and Chrupalla were dismissive of those comments.
“If a player of an ethnic group whom you deem inferior scores goals for you, what are you going to do? Disavow him as belonging to the nation that you love?” asked Markovits. “No … you may deep down still doubt the genuine essence of his nationality, but you accept his goals and appropriate them as your own.”
The Democratic National Committee is betting the world’s biggest sporting event can help build its voter base.
The DNC is launching a nationwide voter registration effort for Sunday’s World Cup final, dispatching organizers, volunteers and campaign staff to FIFA Fan Zones, sports bars and community watch parties with the goal of registering more than 3,000 new Democratic voters.
The effort underscores how both political parties are increasingly viewing major sporting events as opportunities to reach voters — particularly young Americans who may be less likely to attend traditional political events but are gathering in large numbers around the monthlong tournament. In the case of the World Cup final, more than 80,000 people are expected to attend in person.
“From outside FIFA Fan Zones and at World Cup watch parties to bars, restaurants and parks, we’ll spend the weekend registering thousands of new Democrats and having conversations about how we win races up and down the ballot,” DNC Chair Ken Martin said in a statement.
The weekend push spans nearly two dozen states, with Democratic organizers attending events in battlegrounds including Arizona, Pennsylvania and Florida. In Arizona, Democrats plan registration efforts in Phoenix, Chandler, Tempe, Tucson and Yuma.
The campaign builds on the DNC’s broader “When We Count” initiative focused on young voters ahead of the 2026 midterms.
Unlike traditional registration drives centered on college campuses, the program deliberately targets young Americans who are already in the workforce.
About one-third of the program’s fellows are native Spanish speakers.
The party is pairing the registration effort with a four-part national training series that it says will equip more than 1,500 organizers, campaign staff and volunteers with best practices for partisan voter registration.
Professional sports leagues have increasingly embraced civic engagement around elections, and the NBA and WNBA are some of the most visible examples, using arenas as polling locations and partnering on nonpartisan voter registration drives. And conservatives have previously registered voters at NASCAR events.
“The power in sport is that people gather. It creates a sense of belonging,” said Lee Igel, a professor of global sport at New York University. “If you want to get 3,000 people registered to vote at a watch party for a sports mega-event, you’d be hard-pressed not to get closer to 30,000 people” registered.
Igel said the DNC’s initiative takes that relationship between sports and civic participation a step further.
“There’s some precedent when it comes to voting and sports,” he said. “But this picks up on a more recent trend of politicians, elected officials and the organizations they’re connected to tapping into the power of sport.”
He pointed to leaders across the political spectrum, including President Donald Trump and New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, as examples of politicians increasingly recognizing sports’ cultural reach.
“Sport is fun and games,” Igel said, “but the attention it attracts in communities — from eyeballs to people in person — is enormous.”
Andy Burnham’s government intends to scrap Keir Starmer’s plan to implement digital ID, a close ally to the incoming prime minister has confirmed.
Dropping the controversial scheme is part of Burnham’s bid to put his own stamp on government and distance himself from his predecessor’s most divisive policies.
Starmer announced plans for a digital ID scheme last September to crack down on illegal working, but it sparked fears about whether personal data might then be at risk.
Speaking to Laura Kuenssberg on the BBC, deputy Labour leader Lucy Powell said scrapping the programme move would allow ministers to be “laser focused on the cost of living, laser focused on rewiring the economy, rewiring the political system in this country, and clearing the decks, if you like, from of all of the other things that might distract and take away from that in terms of the focus of the government”.
Asked how much money would now be freed up for other means, Powell said: “The OBR said it would cost, I think, £1.8 billion over the over the coming years.
“That’s not an insignificant amount of money. That will obviously be re-prioritised and redistributed in different ways.
“But as I say, it’s not just about the money.
“It’s actually about the attention and the focus, so that the the whole of government machinery can work in service of the agenda and the vision that the Labour government is setting out under under Andy Burnham, and I think that is important.”
She also claimed Burnham will deliver on the Labour manifesto by being “bolder” and “clearer” about what the party stands for.
Powell confirmed there would be a “change of emphasis” on North Sea oil and gas drilling under Burnham as well.
There has been widespread speculation that the new prime minister might issue new drilling licences to boost the UK’s energy security, even though the 2024 Labour manifesto pledged not to.
Though she did not confirm what Burnham intends to do on the divisive topic, Powell said the new PM would take a “more pragmatic approach” towards North Sea drilling.
Powell said: “We’ve been really clear that the way to achieve, in the long term, energy security and lower bills is by ensuring that we do have our our own homegrown, clean, much cheaper energy.
“But we’ve been absolutely clear that North Sea gas and oil is an important part of that transition.
“It’s an important part of the mix, and I think what Andy’s talking about is taking a more pragmatic approach and working with the industry to make sure that it can contribute to that transition and to the the mix that is needed over the long term.
“So let’s see what he’s got to say about that. But I don’t think it’s a change of policy. It’s more a change of emphasis.”
Lucy Powell has claimed speculation about Andy Burnham’s cabinet has been “horrible” in an attack on the media.
The deputy Labour leader blamed the press for reporting on the briefings coming from within the party about who might be in the incoming prime minister’s top team.
Burnham was confirmed as the leader of the Labour Party on Friday after running uncontested to replace Keir Starmer, and will be announced as prime minister on Monday.
He said last week he has not yet decided on his ministers because he thinks it would “cause complete chaos if you start half a reshuffle before you’re in position”.
His refusal to confirm who might be in his cabinet and at the heart of his government operation has led to widespread confusion – even though Burnham has pledged to make Labour more united and to stop in-fighting.
BBC presenter Laura Kuenssberg asked Powell, a close ally to Burnham, about the particularly mixed reports about whether energy secretary Ed Miliband might get a senior position.
The presenter said: “Burnham has promised to end factionalism in the Labour Party but there has been quite a lot of briefing already, a lot of briefing against Ed Miliband.
“It doesn’t bode, very well, does it, for Andy Burnham’s promise of ending all that unhappiness and in-fighting within the party?”
Powell replied: “There’s been a lot of speculation in the media about various individuals which has been really quite horrible, to be honest, and unedifying.
“I know that as political journalists, maybe you’ve not had the story of the Labour leadership crisis to write about for the last few weeks, because actually I’m really proud of the way in which the Labour Party has come together in a consensus around Andy Burnham being the next leader.”
She claimed the media is “looking for other personalities and other disagreements” to write about.
Kuenssberg hit back: “Journalists write about things they are told about.”
Jacob Rees-Mogg, former Tory minister, then criticised Powell’s response while sitting on Kuenssberg’s panel.
“Lucy Powell, an admirable person in many ways, was saying something she knows isn’t true at the end, when she said these stories are coming from disgruntled journalists because they didn’t have a big enough story to write,” he said.
Rees-Mogg added that reporters “do not make things up” and only write “what they are given by politicians”.
Listen to Commons People, the podcast that makes politics easy. Every week, Kevin Schofield and Kate Nicholson unpack the week’s biggest stories to keep you informed. Join us for straightforward analysis of what’s going on at Westminster.
Did you know there are at least three different types of vaginal orgasm?
These include a “wave”, a “volcano,” and an “avalanche” (wave seems to be the most common).
But before we get to classifying the big Os, it’s probably a good idea to work out how to get them in the first place.
Though sex experts stress that fixating on climax can make sex less enjoyable overall, the “gender orgasm gap” remains undeniable. Some research found that within heterosexual couples, men report orgasm in 95% of sexual encounters, while heterosexual women say they only “finish” about 65% of the time.
There’s even a gendered masturbation gap.
A 2024 study, conducted by the University of Essex’s psychology lecturer Dr Megan Klabunde and psychology undergraduate student Emily Dixon, may have found why some women orgasm more than others, however.
Their study suggested it could be down to “interoception”.
What’s “interoception”?
Interoception is a way of understanding your own body’s internal senses. These include being attuned to your heartbeat, hunger levels, bladder fullness, and more.
The Cleveland Clinic says that rather than being a predetermined ability, interoception is “a learned skill that you develop as you grow” – though it can be impaired by certain conditions.
The 2024 study, published in the journal Brain Sciences, asked 360 women to fill in questionnaires about their sexual satisfaction and interoception levels.
Participants were 20% more likely to orgasm through masturbation than partnered sex, and these climaxes were deemed more satisfying, too.
Women who self-reported more frequent and satisfying orgasms were also consistently likelier to describe higher levels of attunement with their body.
“Our study empirically demonstrates that women need to get out of their heads and into their bodies in order to have more frequent and satisfying orgasms,” Dr Klabunde said.
“Orgasms are more frequent and satisfying when a woman is able to focus on how her body is feeling… This study is important because most research looking at orgasms in women have focused on their dysfunction,” rather than focusing on what does work.
How can I improve my interoception?
Dr Klabunde added, “The ability for women to focus their attention on their internal bodily sensations, and trust these sensations, was… associated with increased orgasm satisfaction. Therefore, it is important for women and their partners to trust the woman’s internal bodily experiences during sexual encounters.
“This is critical for fostering orgasmic satisfaction for both solo but also especially for partnered sexual contexts.”
The Cleveland Clinic added that specialised therapy and practicing mindfulness can help, too.
They ended, “Have patience with yourself as you learn new techniques. This learned skill takes time to develop and doesn’t come naturally to everyone”.
Boris Johnson has hit out at Reform UK for consistently taking credit for getting Brexit over the line.
The former Conservative prime minister, who campaigned in the 2019 general election on the promise to “get Brexit done”, claimed Nigel Farage’s party did not do a “bean” towards actually securing our EU exit.
Both Johnson and Farage were part of the Leave movement in the run-up to and shortly after EU referendum in 2016, though on different campaigns – the then-Tory MP Johnson was in Vote Leave while Farage led Leave.EU.
Farage and his party Reform UK – formerly the Brexit Party – have consistently attacked Johnson’s legacy after migration soared once the UK left the EU.
Sky News presenter Trevor Phillips asked Johnson on Sunday: “Are you at all embarrassed by the way that Reform and others are using the term ‘Boriswave’?
“Because it is true that net migration, for better or worse, has been higher as a consequence of decisions you took than any time in our history.”
Johnson said Brexit gave the UK power to “control immigration”.
He continued: “We have the power under Brexit, and under Brexit, which I secured and which those people didn’t – they didn’t even exist!”
“They did not have a single MP,” he said, referring to Reform UK. “They did not do a bean to get Brexit through the House of Commons. Not a bean.
“ And they swank around claiming to have been responsible for it.
“They did, they did nothing to deliver Brexit.
“The hard Brexit I went through the House of Commons I want to move, enables us, enables this country not only to have as few people because we want overall, but also under our laws, to decide who comes from where.”
Reform UK spokesman hit back at that criticism, telling HuffPost UK: “Boris only had his majority because we put country before party in 2019.
“Boris then broke Britain so badly that the Conservatives haven’t led a single opinion poll since.”
Listen to Commons People, the podcast that makes politics easy. Every week, Kevin Schofield and Kate Nicholson unpack the week’s biggest stories to keep you informed. Join us for straightforward analysis of what’s going on at Westminster.
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From our sense of fashion, to our interiors, injecting playfulness and child-like imagination into your style is in – and it’s perhaps no wonder the trend has taken off given the impending doom of war, or the imminent threat of beyond-return climate change, that overshadows our lives.
So, if your home still feels decidedly like the third floor flat it is rather than an enchanted fairy cottage, I’ve made it my job to find 27 pieces of furniture and decor that will transform your space faster than you can say ‘bibbidi-bobbidi-boo’.
This way to floating through life.
Boris Johnson has claimed Donald Trump could “be the guy” to force Vladimir Putin to end his illegal war in Ukraine.
The ex-prime minister made the bizarre claim more than a year after the US president pledged to bring the conflict to a close in just 24 hours.
The war entered its fifth year back in February.
Trump also famously kicked Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy out of the White House last year after his team attacked his outfit and said Kyiv did not “hold any cards” in the war.
Since then, the US has oscillated between pushing Kyiv to give up more land to Moscow in the name of peace, and supporting Ukraine’s ongoing fight against Putin’s land grab.
But, speaking on Sky News, Johnson – who is an ardent supporter of Ukraine – said: “I think that, paradoxically, you know, Trump could be the guy really, to put the hard word on Putin and get this thing done, and there’s no doubt that when it comes to foreign policy initiatives, this is a guy who’s willing to do some, some pretty tough things, right?
“Nobody thought he’s the first American president to use violence against Iran, right?”
Trump chose to join Israel in launching strikes on Iran earlier this year, triggering a significant international conflict and sending the global economy into turmoil.
Johnson continued: “You know, whatever you think about about his logic and how that’s worked out, you know, he is I think he is the guy and I’ve said this to him and I said this repeat.
“I think, paradoxically, although I think that his instincts on on Ukraine haven’t always was language about Ukraine hasn’t always been, you know, put it mildly on, you know, totally on all fours with what I think I think he could he really could fix it. And that’s what I’ve always told him.”
Johnson also acknowledged that Trump has not actually been promoting a push for Ukraine’s sovereignty.
He said: “It would be a very powerful thing if the United States declared that it was, a strategic objective of the United States for Ukraine to be free, sovereign and independent country.”
“No, but you don’t hear that much from Washington, right? And number two, that Ukraine should be part of Nato.”
Asked by presenter Trevor Phillips how Trump responds when Johnson advocates for Ukraine, he said: “I mean, he’s, very good at listening. He’s very good listening.”
Listen to Commons People, the podcast that makes politics easy. Every week, Kevin Schofield and Kate Nicholson unpack the week’s biggest stories to keep you informed. Join us for straightforward analysis of what’s going on at Westminster.
Voters continue to punish Nigel Farage amid the row over his finances as Reform UK slips back in the polls.
According to strategic insight company Opinium, the right-wing party has fallen back to its lowest rate since 2024, having held a comfortable lead with voters for more than a year.
In a survey for the Observer, the pollsters found Reform are currently on 23%.
That’s just one percentage point away from Labour, who on 22%, are at their highest level since April 2026.
It comes as party leader Farage is fighting a by-election he triggered in his constituency of Clacton.
He chose to step down as an MP earlier this month amid heightened scrutiny over his finances.
A parliamentary probe into a £5 million donation he received shortly before he ran in the 2024 general election – but failed to declare – is currently on pause while he is outside of the Commons.
Farage claims he is fighting in a “people versus the establishment” contest, but all major parties have refused to put up a candidate.
The Reform UK leader is now mainly in a race against comedy candidate Count Binface.
Opinium also found the Conservatives are enjoying their highest poll rating since April 2025 on 20%.
Meanwhile, the Green Party lags behind on 14% and the Liberal Democrats are on 11%.
The survey comes after researchers at Survation put both at Labour and Reform UK at 24%.
Polling by More in Common from last week also undermined Farage’s claim not to be part of the establishment.
It showed that 45% of the public believe privately-educated Farage, who is a former MEP and stockbroker, is himself part of the establishment.
That is slightly below Keir Starmer (52%) and Kemi Badenoch (54%), but more than the 41% who think incoming prime minister Andy Burnham is in the establishment.
Listen to Commons People, the podcast that makes politics easy. Every week, Kevin Schofield and Kate Nicholson unpack the week’s biggest stories to keep you informed. Join us for straightforward analysis of what’s going on at Westminster.
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