Partners in what? Certain of us would just as soon not be accomplices to the crime that is globalism, nor share the responsibility for what the mandarins at the EU are doing both to Europe and to the world. The precepts that placed that ruling class in position are going to be challenged, and they need to be. A partner won't do that, but a friend will.
“He said he was “certain to find interlocutors in Washington who know that big countries also needs partners.””
Translation: “We’re certain we can bypass the President via Quislings in the State Department.”
But Herr Steinmeier is going to be shocked should he try that!