Speaker Paul Ryan also supported a US-EU deal as well as a deal with Britain

The US will strike a free trade deal with the European Union before it agrees one with Britain, it was claimed last night.

Unnamed Washington and European officials claimed the UK had been forced behind the EU in the queue to reach a deal with America.

If true, it would signal a dramatic U-turn on the part of the U.S. president, who has so far opposed negotiating with the EU as a bloc and tried instead to reach deals with separate countries - starting with Britain.

The US will strike a free trade deal with the European Union before it agrees one with Britain, it was claimed. It is believed Donald Trump softened his approach to the EU after meeting Angela Merkel, despite frosty body language

According to the Times, Mr Trump has ‘softened’ his opposition to a US-EU deal after Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, convinced him that reaching agreement would be simpler than he thought.

Officials reportedly said Mr Trump’s re-think was also influenced by his administration’s failure to open talks with individual EU members apart from the UK.

It has reportedly led to a ‘realisation’ in the White House that a trade deal with the EU, allowing for a tariff-free exchange of goods and services, would be more beneficial to the US than a post-Brexit deal with Britain.

Mrs Merkel is believed to have won over her White House host. A former White House advisor said: ‘Mr Trump will want good trading terms with everybody in Europe, in or out of the EU'

Mrs Merkel is said to have told senior colleagues that Mr Trump misunderstood the basic facts about the EU and trade, asking her 10 times if he could work out a trade deal with Germany before finally getting the message he could negotiate only with the EU.

The suggestion that Mrs Merkel won over her White House host on anything may come as a surprise given their frosty body language and his apparent refusal at one point to shake hands for the cameras.

Washington insiders noted last night that the two goals - a deal with post-Brexit Britain and one with the EU - are not mutually incompatible.

‘Mr Trump will want good trading terms with everybody in Europe, in or out of the EU,’ said a former White House advisor.

‘He vociferously supported Britain coming out of the EU.

‘He’ll not want to make Brexit look like a mistake.’

House Speaker Paul Ryan, the most powerful Republican in Congress, made clear as much in a speech in London on Wednesday.

He said the US was ready to negotiate a new trade deal with Britain but also wanted a strong Europe.

‘The United States stands ready to forge a new trade agreement with Great Britain as soon as possible, so that we may further tap into the great potential between our people,’ he said in a speech at the Policy Exchange think tank.

Officials reportedly said Mr Trump’s re-think was also influenced by his administration’s failure to open talks with individual EU members apart from the UK

Mr Ryan supported an eventual EU/US trade deal but added: ‘At the same time, we are committed to working with President Trump and your government to achieve a bilateral trade agreement between the United States and Britain.’

If the EU becomes a bigger trade priority for the Trump administration than Britain, it will be an embarrassing blow to the diplomacy skills of Boris Johnson.

The foreign secretary met with Mr Trump’s advisers in January and afterwards claimed Britain would be ‘first in line’ for a deal.

His boast was aimed at refuting President Obama’s warning a year ago that the UK would be ‘at the back of the queue’ if it left the EU.

Lib Dem leader Tim Farron said last night that reports of the US favouring the EU over Britain was a ‘devastating blow to Theresa May’s hard Brexit plans’.

House Speaker Paul Ryan said the US was ready to negotiate a new trade deal with Britain but also wanted a strong Europe

He called on the Prime Minister to make clear she will ‘prioritise’ a trade deal with the EU over one with Mr Trump.

Talks on a US-EU trade deal first started in 1990 but negotiations on the so-called Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) were shelved after Mr Trump’s election victory.

They could now be revived or replaced with a new deal as TTIP has been criticised as too heavily favouring big business.

The EU is America’s biggest trading partner but the US suffers from a substantial trade deficit.

Last year, US exports to the union were worth £210 billion ($270 billion) - in the same period it exported £43 billion ($55 billion) in goods to the UK.

Cecilia Malmström, the EU’s trade commissioner, is visiting Washington next week for informal talks with US commerce secretary Wilbur Ross.