May and Juncker in couples therapy

An unnamed but licensed professional marriage counselor in Brussels forwarded to POLITICO a recording of “Session 14, May 2, 2017” with clients “T May – JC Juncker.” The following is an unedited transcript of their conversation whose accuracy, much less existence, can’t be independently verified.

JEAN-CLAUDE JUNCKER: Before we start this, I need to pour a drink. Care for a gin and tonic, Doctor F…?

MAN WITH HEAVY MITTEL-EUROPEAN ACCENT, PRESUMABLY THE COUNSELOR: Zygmunt, please. And none for me.

JUNCKER: Theresa, would you care for tea?

(audible sigh)

THERESA MAY: Look, Jean-Claude, I don’t have all day. Did you dream up this session so you could leak it? Don’t think we don’t know why and who dished the details of our dinner last week. Is that ghastly valet of yours lurking somewhere here, too, scribbling notes to pass on to a hack in Frankfurt?

JUNCKER: Martin! Come out from behind that curtain and kiss the prime minister’s hand. Just kidding! (Laughs heartily, sound of ice jingling in a glass).

COUNSELOR: Now, you two. Please, we agreed you would try to be constructive. And let me remind you: Dave and Donald tried couples’ therapy in late ’15. You’ve since agreed to separate, OK? Unless you have second thoughts?

JUNCKER: Hmmm…

MAY: None.

“Oh please. Jean-Claude, do you really think I wanted to be in the bloody Justus Lipsius building on a Saturday? I’d rather be out marshaling the Maidenhead running club again” — Theresa May

COUNSELOR: So we’re clear. You’re breaking up this 44–year marriage in exactly two years. I’m here simply to mediate the terms of a good, or at least civilized, divorce.

JUNCKER: Theresa, here’s the thing, you signed a pre-nup — it’s called the EU treaties. Well, maybe you didn’t sign it personally but the U.K. did and here’s what it says: divorce first, then future relations. That’s the sequence, the phases. Call it whatever you like. So first we have to settle accounts. Protect citizens’ rights. Work out the financial terms. Think about the borders, especially Ireland … Why can’t you just accept this? Take Ja for a damn answer. We’ll talk trade, as Barnier says, the sequencing can be dynamic. But only when you settle up your accounts and we figure out citizens’ rights.

MAY: Mr. Juncker, please. First off, we’re leaving so you can’t tell us what to do anymore. You’ve really got to understand that. Second, show me where it says we have to pay anything. Legally, we don’t have to pay a penny. You know that that’s why you’re getting a bit hot and bothered. Now, of course, we’re reasonable people — I’m not some bloody difficult woman (pause, ever-so-slight chuckle). We can come to an arrangement, I’m sure, but obviously, we’ll need our share of all the assets back. So, why don’t we just call it all even?

JUNCKER: We’re only asking you to honor your past commitments. We have put satellites into space together; we are all collectively liable for that. We have helped Ireland in this or that context. We created CERN and ITERA together. But fine. You don’t want to be honorable — and we don’t have to give you access to our 450 million paying consumers. You can take whatever’s left of the U.K. once Scotland and Northern Ireland leave and ask Trump to accept you into their damn union. Bon voyage!

COUNSELOR: Please, you two. You wanted to sort this out like adults, didn’t you?

Theresa May enjoys her dinner Tuesday — perhaps more so than her meal with Juncker last week | Pool photo by Dylan Martinez/Getty Images

JUNCKER: Look at what happened last week.

MAY: That’s a start, indeed.

JUNCKER: I came to see you, because, you know, of course we’ve always said that there aren’t going to be negotiations before the other 27 agree on how they want us to conduct them, but look: As long as you’re in, my Commission represents all 28 member states, including you, so I thought, ‘Why don’t you go, Jean-Claude, be gracious and take Theresa’s points to that summit that she’s not allowed to be at.’

MAY: Oh please. Jean-Claude, do you really think I wanted to be in the bloody Justus Lipsius building on a Saturday? I’d rather be out marshaling the Maidenhead running club again.

JUNCKER: We now meet in the new Europa building. You’d love the color scheme. Your loss forever. But don’t change the subject. Right before I came to see you, you, I mean the U.K., sent an email at the very last minute to say you’re going to block the spending review. Hey, that’s not even fresh money, it was agreed on in 2013 in principle and your guy, the one with the beard who claims to represent you here, has signed off on it already. It was just that some procedures take time, you know how it is, but that vote last week was supposed to be a purely formal thing that doesn’t cost you anything. You’re trying to undermine the EU even before you’ve taken a step out the door.

MAY: I had no choice, Jean-Claude. I can’t commit to anything that would bind my next government, pardon me, Her Majesty’s next government. It’s known as a Purdah period in a mature democracy like this one. You should think about introducing that, too. I mean Purdah, not a mature democracy, though ours is considerably older than yours. You could also try other things like getting your accounts signed off and the like.

JUNCKER: It’s a scandalous abuse, Theresa. More so, you just don’t understand what this means to the EU27. Look, money for Libya, for Syria and so on, means our brand new border guard will be delayed and that just months before Angela’s reelection. And then Manu, of course, I wanted to help him a bit against that horrible woman. Presumably, you prefer Merkel and Macron to sign off on your divorce. They’ll have to. But as a wiser man than me said, ‘two can play that Purdah.’

MAY: What do you mean?

JUNCKER: “FULL PURDAH RECIPROCITY.” (Laughs.) We won’t talk to you about anything then until after your little coronation next month. But then you soon get into summer and then the German elections. I’m sure we’ll come around to negotiations with you in our time and terms around Christmas.

MAY: You’re an impossible little man. No deal is better than a bad deal for us.

COUNSELOR: Tsk-tsk.

MAY: (Sighing deeply.) Look, Jean-Claude, it’s in everybody’s interest to settle all this quickly — especially the citizens’ issue which I can’t for the life of me understand what you Europeans have a problem with. Let’s agree on it now. We’ll honor our commitments to your lot here, and you do the same for our lot over there. Easy.

The leak from Juncker’s side of the table is expected to have only stiffened Theresa May’s resolve | Sean Gallup/Getty Images

JUNCKER: Yes, I agree. We should think about the children first. And then the alimony. And only then we can talk about becoming partners with benefits…

MAY: You wish.

JUNCKER: I’m referring to the future trade relationship. Of course. [Inaudible].

MAY: Too easy for you to play the good guy here. We’re not some two-bit country like Luxembourg you know. We don’t want your damn court. How can I get this through your thick Luxembourgianesque…

JUNCKER: … believe you mean Luxembourgish …

“Then no deal. I’m well aware of your own politics. But to paraphrase Clark Gable, who put it more nicely, I don’t give a …” — Jean-Claude Juncker

MAY: Listen! No customs union, no single market — at least I don’t want it to be called single market membership anymore. We’ll find a nicer name for it. And no ECJ for us.

JUNCKER: Then no deal. I’m well aware of your own politics. But to paraphrase Clark Gable, who put it more nicely, I don’t give a …

COUNSELOR: Mr. President!

JUNCKER: My dear lady lives in another galaxy.

MAY: Your errand boy has used that line before — that little monster chap you have doing your business. I’m very much in your galaxy, Jean-Claude. Sadly.

JUNCKER: To better appreciate the complexity of all this, consider this case related to citizens’ rights, which you seem to think can be resolved by June. What happens to somebody who came to Britain, married a Polish, married an Italian, worked, then became unemployed, the wife still worked, the children one of them disabled, what happens to them? This is not something that you can just say we have a gentlemen’s agreement on and that we treat each other fairly. That will not be enough. What we’ll need is that we’ll have legal guarantees for all these cases. What happens to the French citizen who went to London and was married to a Vietnamese woman before? What happens to them? What happens then? Will it be at some point they have to get divorced because there is Brexit? And if there is some dispute? The European Court of Justice must have a role, not your Home Office, with its 85-page applications for people to prove where they were born.

MAY: As always, Jean-Claude, you’re drowning in detail. Be more ambitious. Trust us. We’re the United Kingdom, not Turkey. This is London talking, not Moscow. Let’s make Brexit a success together. And besides, you can’t tell us what to do. That’s the whole point of Brexit. Go back and tell your Mutti in Berlin that.

JUNCKER: First of all, I did trust you and look what happened. We’ve spent the past 18 months in Europe digesting your internal party squabbles. And second of all, here’s a news alert for you: We don’t want and won’t do anything to help make Brexit a success. We all lose here, but you will lose more than us.

MAY: Is there a grown up I can talk to?

JUNCKER: You’re — what did Angela call it — oh, yes, delusional.

MAY: No, I’m just a bloody difficult woman.

COUNSELOR: Time’s up. See you next week.

Theresa May is welcomed by Jean-Claude Juncker in October 2016 — before things tumbled downhill | Thierry Charlier/AFP via Getty Images