Penny Lancaster, 53, and her husband, musician Sir Rod Stewart, 80, were friends of President Trump after they became neighbours in the Palm Beach area of Florida.
The trio struck up a friendship that saw Penny and Sir Rod invited to several functions and events held at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate on the Florida coast.
But when Trump announced his intention to become President ahead of the 2016 election as the Republican representative, things quickly changed.
Penny told the Loose Women panel: ‘It’s uncomfortable. Going over to his house [nowadays] is an absolute no-no. We didn’t really know what he was like – he seemed to be generous.
‘He’d give to charity and do these big functions. Obviously we’ve now seen a different side of him.’
She continued: ‘[Around 2015] we started to hear the dangerous rhetoric – those comments where he said Mexicans were rapists and that Muslims were terrorists.
‘I [thought], “Woah, this is just crossing all sorts of boundaries.” This man sounds like he’s going to disrupt the world in a very unfortunate way.
‘From that point onwards, I said to Rod, “We are not going anywhere near him, I cannot be in the same space”. In the end, we turned down any further [function] invitations and that was it.’
However, the awkward thing for Penny and Sir Rod is that they still live close by to President Trump’s estate and it seems they have been unable to move on completely.
‘We’re still next-door neighbours [with President Trump],’ she added. ‘We’re literally five minutes form his house.’
And apparently the trouble doesn’t stop there, with Penny claiming that Trump’s second stint in the White House inconveniences people in the Palm Beach area.
‘Because he’s President again, he blocks all the roads [whenever he visits] – so you have to go the long way around to get anywhere. He literally controls that whole part of Florida.’
Penny’s comments support similar ones made by her rock singer husband Sir Rod, who has also reflected on the breakdown of his friendship with President Trump.
In 2024, Sir Rod spoke on his relationship with the 45th and 47th President, saying that things had definitely soured between them over the years.
‘He’s not the guy I met 20 years ago,’ Sir Rod told MailOnline. ‘I used to go to his house every Christmas and do concerts. He was a good guy. But he’s turned into somewhat of a monster.’
Sir Rod then told Scottish Field: ‘I have a house in Palm Beach just up the road from Trump. I used to go to his Christmas party and the balls he held.
‘But my wife said “No”. There was stuff he was coming out with, what he was saying about women he had known in the past, and Penny said “You’re not going – he’s a disgrace”.’
In 2018, Sir Rod said that Trump’s ‘moral compass’ was ‘way off’ and credited former President Barack Obama with the ‘country doing extremely well’ during Trump’s first term.
Loose Women airs weekdays at 12.30pm on ITV.
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