UK PM Burnham exchanged messages with impersonator posing as Trump's aide

Andy Burnham communicated with someone posing as White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, an incident on which Downing Street has declined to comment

UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham exchanged messages with a person impersonating one of US President Donald Trump’s closest advisers, multiple media reports said on Monday.

 

The newly appointed British prime minister communicated with someone posing as White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, an incident on which Downing Street has declined to comment, citing “national security matters”, but without denying it, the Financial Times reported.

 

The White House has also declined to comment.

 

According to Politico, which first reported the incident, four officials confirmed that Burnham had exchanged messages with the impersonator. One of them said Burnham had exchanged a “few messages” with the person before becoming suspicious that the contact was illegitimate, but insisted they were “of no significance”.

 

 

The British embassy in Washington raised concerns about the exchanges with the White House after Burnham communicated with the impersonator, Politico reported, quoting two officials. The suspicious activity was “quickly reported to the appropriate authorities”, FT reported.

 

Following the incident, the UK government feared that Wiles’ phone may have been hacked again. The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) last year investigated an attempted hack of her personal phone after politicians and business executives received text messages and phone calls from someone claiming to be the White House chief of staff.

 

The new prime minister has yet to meet his US counterpart, who has heavily criticised the UK’s policies on fossil fuels and immigration.

 

It remains unclear when the exchange between Burnham and Wiles’ impersonator took place or exactly what the messages contained.

 

This is not the first time a senior British politician has been targeted by an impersonator posing as a foreign political figure. In 2024, then foreign secretary Lord David Cameron exchanged text messages and took a video call from someone posing as former Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko before becoming suspicious of the impersonation.