Jane Onyanga-Omara

USA TODAY

LONDON — Mike Pence spoke to British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson late Thursday in what is thought to be Pence’s first phone call to a foreign politician since becoming U.S. vice president-elect

“We agreed on importance of the special relationship & need to tackle global challenges together,” Johnson tweeted following the conversation.

Earlier Thursday, Johnson told European leaders to stop the "collective whinge-o-rama" over Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. presidential election Wednesday and called Trump "a deal maker" who wants a free trade agreement with the United Kingdom.

"I believe that this is a great opportunity for us in the U.K. to build on that relationship with America that is of fundamental economic importance to us, but also, great importance for the stability and prosperity of the world," Johnson said at a news conference in in Belgrade, Serbia.

"I would respectfully say to my beloved European friends and colleagues that it's time that we snapped out of the general doom and gloom about the result of this election and collective 'whinge-o-rama' that seems to be going on in some places."

British Prime Minister Theresa May congratulated Trump on his election and said the two nations’ “special relationship” would continue as the countries “remain, strong and close partners on trade, security and defense.”

Parallels run strong with shocking Trump U.S. victory and Brexit

After Obama said earlier this year that the U.K. would be at the "back of the queue” for any trade deal with the U.S. if Britons voted to leave the European Union, Trump told ITV’s Good Morning Britain that scenario would not be the case if he became president.

“I am going to treat everybody fairly but it wouldn't make any difference to me whether they were in the EU or not. You would certainly not be back of the queue, that I can tell you," Trump said in the interview in May.

The U.K. voted to leave the 28-member bloc — dubbed Brexit — at a referendum in June.