LONDON — On the eve of his first state visit, President Donald Trump is giving British officials reason to believe this latest overseas trip will be no different from his disruptive foray into local politics when he was here last July.

The normally unpredictable president provoked déjà vu on Saturday when he granted an explosive interview to The Sun, a newspaper owned by Fox News founder Rupert Murdoch. Weighing in on a series of domestic issues, Trump insisted that the outgoing prime minister, Theresa May, could have “built up a big advantage” for Britain during Brexit negotiations if she had only heeded his advice, and he described Meghan Markle, an American actress who became the Duchess of Sussex upon marrying Prince Harry last May, as “nasty” for once referring to him as misogynistic. (In a subsequent tweet, Trump claimed his comment was taken out of context.)

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The interview, which posted just 48 hours before Trump is set to arrive on Monday morning, and nearly a year after he dismissed The Sun as “fake news” after his first interview with the British tabloid — which included repeated jabs at May and a threat to cancel trade talks if she pursued a “soft Brexit” deal — shattered diplomatic protocol.

This time, though, Trump’s pre-arrival press strategy stretched beyond a single outlet.

The American leader and his national security adviser, John Bolton, have given separate interviews to at least four local outlets ahead of the visit, touching on subjects such as Brexit and Iran and attempting to turn the search for May’s successor into a transatlantic race. All of it comes just a week after Trump faced widespread criticism for making similarly contentious comments about North Korea’s leader, Kim Jong Un, during a ceremonial visit to Japan.

“It’s very much the president’s style,” said Nile Gardiner, a former aide to Margaret Thatcher and a foreign policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank in Washington. “It’s quite controversial and perhaps unusual.”

Some, like Gardiner, see a strategy behind Trump’s comments — even if they’ve set the stage for a series of awkward encounters with May and the royal family. Trump will spend time with Queen Elizabeth during his visit, in addition to meeting Prince Charles and his wife, Camilla, the duchess of Cornwall; Prince William and his wife, Catherine, the duchess of Cambridge; and Prince Harry.

“I think the president sees a big U.S. national interest in the success of Brexit, and so he’s wading into the debate because of what is at stake,” Gardiner told POLITICO, describing Trump’s approach as “pragmatic.”

In a norm-breaking move, Trump told The Sun he supported the longtime Brexiteer Boris Johnson in his bid to succeed May, whom he simultaneously accused of allowing “the European Union to have all the cards” during negotiations over the Britain’s withdrawal from the bloc.

“I had mentioned to Theresa that you have got to build up your ammunition,” Trump said, claiming that May failed to give the E.U. “anything to lose.”

Trump made headlines again over the weekend in a wide-ranging interview with The Sunday Times. This time, he encouraged May’s successor to refuse to pay a “divorce” settlement to the E.U. and to “sue” Brussels in order to gain leverage during Brexit talks. Trump also said the Brexit Party’s leader, Nigel Farage, with whom he’s met several times, should be involved in the dealmaking process; threatened to halt intelligence sharing with Britain if government officials grant the Chinese telecom company Huawei access to the country’s first 5G network; and also said he would have better acquainted himself with Jeremy Corbyn, a staunch Trump critic, before sharing U.S. intelligence with the Labour leader.

Trump’s comments about the leadership race and Brexit — two of the most sensitive political topics inside Britain — were hardly a surprise to anyone who caught Bolton’s interviews. The top security adviser conducted a series of meetings here last week in preparation for Trump’s arrival, though a National Security Council spokesperson declined to tell POLITICO whom Bolton met or what topics he discussed.

Asked by Britain’s Sky News last week whether Trump should withhold his personal opinions on Brexit and the Conservative leadership contest, Bolton responded: “The president will do what the president wants.”

He told the The Daily Telegraph in another interview that Britain’s departure from the E.U. would have a positive change in global politics and longstanding military alliances

“As a separate nation again, Britain’s impact on the world has the prospect of being even greater,” Bolton said. “I think it will help us in NATO in particular to have another strong and independent country that will help NATO be more effective, and that has to be a plus.”

The media blitz by Trump and Bolton come as British officials prepare to roll out the red carpet for the first family, despite criticism from some local leaders. London’s mayor, Sadiq Khan, said on Sunday that it was “un-British” to greet Trump with the extraordinary degree of pomp and pageantry that comes with a state visit.

“In years to come, I suspect this state visit will be one we look back on with profound regret,” Khan wrote in an op-ed for The Observer.

Trump will spend three days in the U.K. with his wife, Melania, and adult children before traveling to Ireland and France for bilateral meetings and a ceremony to mark the 75th anniversary of the Normandy landings. He is likely to wade into Brexit politics and the search for Britain’s next prime minister once more on Tuesday, when he and May are due to participate in a joint press conference following their final meeting during her tenure at 10 Downing Street.

For the House’s growing impeachment caucus, June is shaping up to be the most critical month to make their case to a reluctant Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

A month packed with subpoena fights, hearings on obstruction of justice and legal battles over Trump’s financial records is certain to provide fresh ammunition to grow the pro-impeachment ranks.

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“The temperature’s rising, the plot is thickening. It’s hard for me to imagine Congress certainly leaving for the August recess without some closure on this,” said Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.), who supports impeachment. “The Hamlet act is, I think, wearing thin, and it’s becoming untenable and intellectually strange.”

But Democrats eager to launch impeachment proceedings against President Donald Trump fear they’re running out of time to persuade Pelosi to change course before presidential politics consumes Washington.

The House returns from a weeklong recess on Monday a few days after special counsel Robert Mueller ratcheted up pressure on lawmakers by emphasizing that Congress is the venue for holding a law-breaking president accountable. Mueller’s words — the first he uttered since the start of his two-year investigation into the Trump campaign’s links to Russia and potential presidential obstruction — prompted a wave of House Democrats to endorse an impeachment inquiry.

Mueller underscored that the Justice Department’s guidelines prohibit him from charging a sitting president with a crime — a notion Democrats interpreted as a direct referral to Congress. But Pelosi has remained unmoved, calling for deliberative steps to investigate Trump and urging against rushing into impeachment proceedings.

“It sounds like you think that the President will be impeached, or at least proceedings will begin in the House at some point, but just not right now?” CNN “State of the Union” host Jake Tapper asked Clyburn.

“Yes, that’s exactly what I feel,” Clyburn replied.

Clyburn’s statement also indicted that the number of Democrats in favor of impeachment proceedings could be well above the approximately 50 members who have stated their view publicly.

Yet Mueller’s comments provide the backdrop for a month filled with moments that are likely to push even more Democrats to call for impeachment proceedings and dial up pressure on Pelosi, whose stance against rushing into an impeachment inquiry could become unsustainable, some Democrats say.

“Obviously, people are very frustrated that we haven’t moved faster. Frankly, I’m frustrated because we have been held up by the unprecedented action by the White House to deny all witnesses,” House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler said during an appearance Friday on WNYC. “We can only go so far until we can win in court. That’s why we have to get the contempt citations on the floor of the House as soon as possible, which I’ve been pushing for.”

Nadler also threw cold water on some Democrats’ urgency to begin impeachment proceedings before the 2020 campaign is in full swing, saying it’s important to send a message to future presidents about their conduct.

“[Trump’s] reelection would be an absolute catastrophe,” Nadler said. “But beyond preventing that catastrophe and getting a decent president into office, we have to vindicate the Constitution. Even in those circumstances, it might be well worth carrying on impeachment.”

In the meantime, Nadler is pushing Pelosi to immediately call a vote to hold Attorney General William Barr in contempt for refusing to provide Congress with Mueller’s underlying evidence. Nadler on Friday vented his frustration that Trump’s White House has so far managed to delay efforts to access that information as well as testimony from Mueller’s most explosive witness, former White House counsel Don McGahn.

On Tuesday, two former Trump aides — longtime confidante Hope Hicks and former White House lawyer Annie Donaldson — are due to turn over documents subpoenaed by the House Judiciary Committee as part of that panel’s effort to delve into Mueller’s obstruction of justice findings. Both are also due to testify later in June.

But Democrats are anticipating that the White House will intervene to block their cooperation, pointing to the president’s instruction to McGahn last month to defy the committee’s subpoena. Some Democrats see the White House’s inevitable directives to Hicks and Donaldson as another chance to lure more of their colleagues into the pro-impeachment camp.

Blocking testimony from McGahn, Hicks and Donaldson denies Democrats opportunities to put the 448-page Mueller report — which they say Americans haven’t read — on camera in an easy-to-digest format. Holding public hearings is essential for moving public opinion in favor of impeachment, Democrats say.

“Part of the function of Congress, just the same as the Watergate hearings 40 years ago, [is] to have a dialogue with the American people so people can make informed decisions and know what’s going on,” Nadler said.

In all, the ranks of pro-impeachment Democrats swelled to more than 50 through the end of May — but that’s less than a quarter of the more than 230 House Democrats. The number of Democrats who publicly backed impeachment after Mueller’s statement included committee chairs — Rules Committee Chairman Jim McGovern among them — and another member of the House Judiciary Committee, which oversees impeachment matters.

Until now, Democrats’ strategy to investigate Trump has been scattershot. Six committees have been investigating aspects of Trump’s personal conduct and financial dealings, but Trump’s all-out resistance has mired their efforts in a battle over process-related minutiae rather than the details of Mueller’s findings.

Democrats intend to change that focus in June, promising a torrent of hearings on the dozen instances of possible obstruction of justice that Mueller examined, as well as testimony from former federal prosecutors — including Republicans — who say Trump would have been indicted were he not the president.

A senior House Democratic aide said June will be a particularly important test for the Judiciary Committee — the forum for these hearings, as well as any potential impeachment battle — to make the most of Mueller’s words and the substance of his report, which paints a damning picture of a chaotic White House and president seeking to thwart Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 election.

“It’s a crucial month for that particular committee because Mueller did give us a gift and an opportunity to refocus the narrative back to the substance of the report,” the aide said.

“It’s about whether Democrats — the Judiciary Committee, specifically — can exploit this moment and Mueller’s statements to ignite a national conversation about the extent of President Trump’s abuse of power and ways to hold him accountable,” the aide continued. “The true test of that is going to be in June. If you can’t do that with what he gave us, there’s no way you’re ready for impeachment.”

June also features the next wave of court filings in Democrats’ efforts to compel banks and an accounting firm to turn over Trump’s financial information as part of their probes of potential conflicts of interest and money laundering. Key victories in the early rounds of those court battles — and the expedited consideration of Trump’s appeals to those rulings — have emboldened Pelosi and her allies to pursue a more deliberative course.

“To the extent that we’re able to conduct these inquiries and get information and documents and testimony without resorting to some kind of impeachment inquiry, I think that that will probably stave off taking that next step,” Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), a member of the Oversight and Intelligence committees and a Pelosi ally, said in an interview.

“If there are folks who believe in their hearts that impeachment is necessary, then obviously a case has to be made that is sustainable in the Senate as well,” Krishnamoorthi added. “And in order to do that, you have to do something that moves the American people at the same time. And that’s why the investigations are so important.”

But Democrats who favor impeachment proceedings see the court rulings as proof that the Trump administration is trying to run out the clock on their probes. They say the window for impeachment will soon close as the 2020 presidential campaign ramps up.

“Once you’re into the campaign, everything is inherently partisan, and I think it really does make this moot,” said Tom Steyer, the billionaire liberal activist who has been targeting House Democrats for more than a year to urge them to back impeachment.

“Most of us believe that there will come a point where if you get too close to the election, all the politics are going to lean toward just taking it to the voters,” added Huffman.

President Donald Trump’s desire to avoid a war with Iran appears to be prevailing in his own administration — for now.

On Sunday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said the United States is willing to talk to Iran’s Islamist leaders without preconditions, even as the U.S. deploys hundreds more troops to the region amid rising tensions.

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“We are prepared to engage in a conversation with no pre-conditions, we are ready to sit down,” Pompeo said.

While Pompeo added the U.S. still wants Iran to behave like a “normal nation,” his overall remarks appeared to be a climb-down from the past, including his insistence that Tehran meet 12 far-reaching conditions as part of any deal. Pompeo is known for his closeness to Trump and willingness to adjust his own messaging to fall in line with the president’s thinking.

His announcement followed reports that Iranian President Hassan Rouhani had said Tehran would talk to the Americans if they showed “respect” instead of issuing orders. Iranian officials previously had ruled out talks with the Trump team.

Taken together, the developments suggest that international efforts, either publicly or behind the scenes, to convince the two sides to de-escalate tensions were having an effect. Pompeo spoke while visiting Switzerland, which often serves as an intermediary between the U.S. and Iran, though the Swiss have been unwilling to details what role, if any, they now play.

The statements from both sides also come as Trump has made it increasingly clear that he does not want a military conflict with Iran. His stance has put him publicly at odds with aides such as Pompeo and national security adviser John Bolton, who have taken a harder line.

Bolton has been especially bellicose, even though it has strained his relationship with Trump. He has threatened Iran with “unrelenting force,” and in recent days blamed Iran for a spate of attacks on U.S. allies, including drone attacks carried out by Houthi rebels on targets in Saudi Arabia.

Pompeo has been more cautious, indicating he’s trying to channel the president, an effort that is not easy given Trump’s mercurial nature.

The White House did not immediately respond to requests for comment Sunday.

Michael O’Hanlon, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution said the Trump administration is asking Iran to believe both that the U.S. will be very hard line and that it doesn’t want war. “It remains to be seen if that combination represents a viable basis for talks,” he said. “Certainly, skepticism is in order.”

Trump ran for office in 2016 pledging to reduce U.S. entanglements abroad. He’s reached out to Iranian leaders in the past, such as during the 2017 U.N. General Assembly, only to be rebuffed, and even as early as July 2018 said he’d be willing to talk to Iran without pre-conditions.

More recently, however, Trump has appeared to effectively dismiss the 12 conditions Pompeo had placed on Iran for any serious negotiations to take place.

Those conditions included everything from Iran ending its support for militias outside its borders to halting its ballistic missile program. They were so far reaching that analysts said they were essentially a call for regime change.

Trump, however, has said in recent weeks that he’s only interested in making sure Iran never obtains nuclear weapons. “We aren’t looking for regime change,” Trump said this past week while in Tokyo. “I just want to make that clear. We are looking for no nuclear weapons.”

The president also stressed that if Iran and the United States could come to an acceptable agreement, the U.S. would be able to help Iran save its economy, which has been battered by American sanctions.

The mixed signals from Trump and his team have frustrated Middle Eastern officials, Democratic lawmakers and other observers of the region, some of whom fear that even if both sides don’t want a war, a miscalculation could lead to it.

Critics note that many of the tensions today stem from Trump’s decision to withdraw the United States from the Iran nuclear deal negotiated by the Obama administration in 2015. That deal lifted many U.S. sanctions on Iran in exchange for Iran shuttering its nuclear program.

In the past, Trump has complained that the 2015 deal didn’t do enough to restrain Iran’s non-nuclear misbehavior, including its support for terrorist groups. His more recent comments suggest he’s willing to make essentially the same kind of deal.

“I really believe that Iran would like to make a deal,” he said while in Tokyo. “And I think that’s very smart of them. And I think that’s a possibility to happen also.”

According to reports that quoted Iranian state media, Rouhani, the country’s president, said Saturday: “We are for logic and talks if (the other side) sits respectfully at the negotiating table and follows international regulations, not if it issues an order to negotiate.”

It’s not at all clear that Iran will view Pompeo’s latest offer as showing enough respect, or whether it will believe Trump’s words given his actions toward Tehran. In an interview with ABC‘s “This Week,“ Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif said Iran isn’t likely to negotiate with the United States.

“It’s not very likely because talking is the continuation of the process of pressure,” he said. “He’s imposing pressure. This may work in a real estate market. It does not work in dealing with Iran.”

The president has levied extremely tough sanctions on Iran, badly damaging its economy, even threatening other countries with sanctions if they keep buying oil from Iran. He also decided to designate Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps — a government body — as a terrorist group, a move some believe has contributed to the recent tensions.

Even as he’s said he wants to talk to the Iranians, Trump approved a decision last month to speed up the deployment of an aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf, in response to alleged Iranian threats against U.S. troops and facilities in the region.

Days ago, he deployed or extended the tours of some 1,500 U.S. troops to the region amid suspicions that Iran was behind attacks on oil and related infrastructure of U.S. allies such as Saudi Arabia.

Trump administration officials say this “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran is designed to cut off its funding so that it cannot support militia or terrorist activity outside its borders, eventually forcing it to come to the table for talks.

Officially, the administration’s position is that it is not seeking regime change in Iran, but rather a change in the regime’s behavior. There are some in the administration, however, who hope that economic conditions will become so dire that the Iranian people will rise up and overthrow their Islamist rulers.

Matthew Choi contributed to this report.

SAN FRANCISCO — Bernie Sanders put down roots in California during the last presidential race — and he never really left. Now, he is making the delegate-rich, early voting state, where progressives are ascendant, a central part of his 2020 campaign.

But as the Vermont senator sets up camp here again, he finds himself in a different and perhaps less favorable environment, without Hillary Clinton to play off, surging energy behind a progressive rival in Elizabeth Warren and a popular home-state senator, Kamala Harris.

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A crush of events this weekend centered around the state Democratic Party convention here — from ballroom speeches to intimate meals to a liberal forum organized by the influential group MoveOn — laid bare the emerging scramble to cut into Sanders’ progressive base.

“Last time, Sanders was able to run as the only progressive against an establishment candidate,” said Doug Herman, a California-based Democratic strategist. “There are multiple options for a progressive candidate at this point—if that’s who you want to elect. And polling is showing that Warren is taking the biggest bite out of Bernie’s base.”

California’s Super Tuesday primary — and the liberal-leaning state’s glut of delegates — has heightened its importance next year. The convention served as a kind of curtain-raiser for its millions of voters, but also a chance to chip away at Sanders’ standing in front of plugged-in activists. Public and private polls of the state, which largely mirror national figures at the top, show former Vice President Joe Biden running in the lead, followed by Sanders, Harris and Warren.

Warren, Sanders’ chief rival on the left, made an unmistakable show of force in San Francisco, offering herself as an uncompromising fighter while touting her plans to hike taxes on the richest Americans and zero-out mounting student loan debt. A day after headlining a big rally Friday in Oakland, she used the convention to promote her platform of ambitious, structural change: “We will not be a party that nibbles around the edges,” she declared to huge applause.

The Massachusetts senator implicitly contrasted her transformational appeals with Biden, who was absent from the events in California, after using the first weeks of his campaign to advocate a return to bipartisanship. “Too many powerful people in our party say, ‘settle down, back up, nothing to be angry about,’” Warren said.

“Some say if we all just calm down, the Republicans will come to their senses,” she added to boos. “But our country is in a time of crisis. The time for small ideas is over!”

The early jostling for key liberal constituencies played out at other events as well, like a union-sponsored breakfast that drew a half-dozen presidential hopefuls vowing to turn back the Trump administration’s rollback of some labor protections, which Harris called an “unapologetic attack” on labor.

In an interview with POLITICO, Harris addressed how she’s trying to appeal to California progressives who didn’t support Clinton and found themselves drawn to Sanders’ bid in 2016.

“My message to them is that I intend to earn their vote and I’m not taking anything for granted,” said Harris, who drew large, energetic crowds everywhere she went and had a heavy footprint at the convention. “They’ve been with me, shoulder to shoulder, arms and arm through many fights together, whether it’s fighting the big banks in the U.S., or marriage equality, or the Homeowners Bill of Rights. We’ve been in tough fights before — and we’ve won.”

At the labor meeting, Sen. Amy Klobuchar highlighted her family’s union roots; former Rep. Beto O’Rourke spoke of seeking a higher minimum wage and springing working-class immigrants from wage “bondage,” and South Bend, Ind. Mayor Pete Buttigieg talked about his city’s post-industrial path back to prosperity, acknowledging that he doesn’t resemble the “dictionary definition” of a presidential candidate that’s been “marinated in Washington.”

“In these times, Democrats can no more promise to take us back to the 2000s or 1990s than conservatives can take us back to the 1950s,” Buttigieg said. “We can only look forward.”

In the liberal bastion of Oakland, Harris’ hometown, a crowd of more than 6,000 lined the streets for a half-mile and packed Warren’s rally on a soccer field. In the mix of Baby Boomers and Millennials, many wore T-shirts emblazoned with “Persist” and clutched signs that said, “She Has A Plan.’’At the end of an hour-long speech, Warren offered to stay as long as necessary so that “everyone gets a selfie.”

John Foster, a party activist from the city, voted for Sanders last time, but said he’s searching for a different voice and a different candidate — with the priority being one who can unseat Trump.

“I’m not a ‘Bernie Bro,’” he said, adding, “Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden feel a little tired to me.”

Foster said Warren piqued his interest because she appears substantive, and ready to offer more details about her plans for change. “I really appreciate her economic justice package, and a lot of what I’ve read on her taxation and education proposals,’’ he said.

At the MoveOn forum Saturday, Warren and others made their pitches to the left. Cory Booker talked about his “baby bonds” plan to confront wealth inequality by giving newborns savings accounts and adding money into them every year. But the New Jersey senator also took a hard line on locally-based tech giants that facilitate the spread racism: “I’m going to make sure that here out in Silicon Valley, these social media platforms do not become platforms for hate and bigotry,” Booker pledged.

O’Rourke’s big idea centers on respecting immigrants rather than punishing them with threats of deportation, a position he said should not be embraced anywhere in his party. And he acknowledged that women in the presidential race face unequal — even sexist — treatment in how their campaigns are covered or talked about: “There are advantages in this race that I have that I did not earn,” O’Rourke conceded.

Asked about Warren’s wealth tax earlier in the day, Harris allowed that her rival was “onto something,” before pivoting to her own tax proposal that provides $500 monthly rebates to families earning less than $100,000 a year. Harris’ plan to pay women equally to men drew a standing ovation at the liberal event while the loudest cheers on the party convention floor came amid her calls to impeach Trump.

Sanders, who addresses the full convention Sunday, focused his MoveOn remarks on ideas that have become commonplace in the party like Medicare for all. He directed considerable time to stopping “endless wars” and cutting military spending.

Sanders’ aides and allies liken California to the four traditional early voting states and pledged a vigorous campaign here. At a rally Friday in Pasadena, he went out of his way to thank the state’s voters for their “great support” in 2016 in talking about its importance to him in 2020.

Sanders announced on the opening day of the convention that he had made his first hires in California, including Shelli Jackson as state coordinator and Susie Shannon as political director. He also installed regional directors in Los Angeles, San Diego, the San Francisco Bay area and in the Inland Empire and Orange County. Campaign Manager Faiz Shakir said Sanders would build a “volunteer army” in the state.

But some Democratic strategists privately noted Sanders’ apparent lack of emphasis in the state’s more conservative Central Valley — a potential opening for others to claim voters there. O’Rourke and Julian Castro have both traveled to the Central Valley recently, and Buttigieg is scheduled to appear at a town hall in Fresno on Monday.

Dan Gordon, a North Hollywood Democratic strategist who runs the “Schmolitics” podcast and served as a delegate for Sanders in 2016, said he remains a “big supporter of his ideas.” Though he may support Sanders again this year, he said, he is still looking at others, including Warren, Buttigieg and Harris, and he wished Sanders wouldn’t run.

“I think he’s divisive, and it’s not entirely his fault,” Gordon said. “There’s still bad blood from people who were Hillary supporters and Bernie supporters. Like most every Democrat, I want to make sure that a Democrat wins in 2020, and I’m a little bit nervous about the divisiveness that comes with Bernie.”

He said, “I think he can do more good as a visionary leader on the outside.”

David Siders and Jeremy B. White contributed to this report.