{"id":158295,"date":"2025-07-25T15:58:07","date_gmt":"2025-07-25T15:58:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/what-some-of-trumps-scotland-golf-course-neighbors-have-to-say-ahead-of-his-visit-cbs-news\/"},"modified":"2025-07-25T15:58:07","modified_gmt":"2025-07-25T15:58:07","slug":"what-some-of-trumps-scotland-golf-course-neighbors-have-to-say-ahead-of-his-visit-cbs-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/what-some-of-trumps-scotland-golf-course-neighbors-have-to-say-ahead-of-his-visit-cbs-news\/","title":{"rendered":"What some of Trump&#039;s Scotland golf course neighbors have to say ahead of his visit &#8211; CBS News"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Watch CBS News<br \/>           <time datetime=\"2025-07-25T11:33:43-0400\">Updated on:  July 25, 2025 \/ 11:33 AM EDT<\/time>           \/ CBS News         <br \/><em>Balmedie, Scotland<\/em>&nbsp;&mdash; President <span class=\"link\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/news\/trump-scotland-trip-protests-golf-resorts-trade-tariff-starmer-meeting\/\" data-invalid-url-rewritten-http=\"\">Trump is due to arrive in Scotland<\/a><\/span> Friday for a four-day private trip &mdash; his first to the U.K since he was re-elected. The White House says he&#8217;ll meet during his visit with Prime Minister Keir Starmer to discuss trade, but he&#8217;ll also be opening a brand-new course at the Trump International Golf Links. <br \/>Set on Scotland&#8217;s rugged northeast coast, it&#8217;s a stunningly beautiful location, and it&#8217;s easy to see why Mr. Trump was keen to purchase the site more than a decade ago and develop it into a world-class golf club.<br \/>But as CBS News learned from speaking with locals, many struggle to separate the American president&#8217;s politics from his putting green.&nbsp;<br \/>David Milne bought his old Coast Guard look-out on the Aberdeenshire coast over 20 years ago, and he still lives there today. But since 2012, it&#8217;s been right in the middle of Trump territory, surrounded by hundreds of acres of shifting sand dunes that have been meticulously sculpted into 36 holes that anyone can play a round on &mdash; for about $500.<br \/>Milne isn&#8217;t happy about his new neighbor.<br \/>&#8220;It&#8217;s always second-best to what was there originally,&#8221; he told CBS News. &#8220;When I came in here, this landscape was untouched&hellip; now it&#8217;s just a golf course.&#8221;<br \/>Mr. Trump first purchased the land in 2006, and during development he offered to buy some of the neighbors&#8217; places, too, but Milne refused to sell. <br \/>In 2011, Mr. Trump said he didn&#8217;t like the look of Milne&#8217;s property anyway.<br \/>&#8220;Who cares,&#8221; the future president told the Golf Channel, pointing to Milne&#8217;s home. &#8220;We&#8217;re trying to build the greatest course in the world. The house is ugly.&#8221;&nbsp;<br \/>Asked what the land means to himself and his family, Milne said it was much more than just a patch of picturesque coastline. <br \/>&#8220;Land is what Scotland is. Not just financially, it&#8217;s in the soul of the Scottish people as well. It is where we come from, and where we go back to,&#8221; he said. &nbsp;<br \/>The visit to Scotland is a homecoming for Mr. Trump, too. His mother, born Mary Anne MacLeod in 1912, grew up on a the Scottish Hebridean island of Lewis. He named one of his courses in Aberdeenshire after her.&nbsp;<br \/>Mr. Trump has been met with protests on previous visits, and vandalism at his golf courses has taken a political tone in recent months. <br \/>Tommy Campbell, a veteran labor union activist in Scotland, told CBS News he was planning to lead another protest during the U.S. leader&#8217;s visit this weekend, with a clear message for Mr. Trump:<br \/>&#8220;You are not welcome here,&#8221; he said. &#8220;The policies that he represents are completely at odds with what we value here.&#8221;<br \/>&nbsp;A poll conducted in February found around 70% of Scots have an unfavorable opinion of President Trump. In the village near his golf links, CBS News spoke with the members of a walking club, who hold a grudge.<br \/>&nbsp;&#8220;The way he treated the neighbors and property owners, I think that influenced us all badly,&#8221; said one woman.<br \/>But the course employs more than 80 people, and the White House says it has had a positive economic impact in the area. &nbsp;<br \/>One local man &mdash; a golfer &mdash; told CBS News the business Mr. Trump has done, &#8220;from a golf perspective, is fantastic.&#8221;<br \/>&#8220;Not saying the protests are not right,&#8221; he added. &#8220;Some of the stuff, I&#8217;d agree with the protesters, but I think there&#8217;s a time and a place for it, and it&#8217;s not on the golf course.&#8221;&nbsp;<br \/>Opinions about President Trump are a bit like the weather in Aberdeenshire. But fair or foul &mdash; in true Scottish fashion &mdash; they&#8217;re unlikely to stop a good round of golf.<br \/>       &copy; 2025 CBS Interactive Inc. All Rights Reserved.     <br \/>Copyright &copy;2025 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/rss\/articles\/CBMilAFBVV95cUxOQjNwV3FjejJTQWFHbzFNbDROeU1OQXVRVVlmRVJBRXp2Nl9EVjhxWjR6ZWNPWm11ZndHVWtEbDk2TDhmQTJnazZLNlUtRzZEelN5ZkdTWDIxVE0wUjJCMGhEOUtWWjlWeHNFM3BxTFNneVBoX19EMTBQcXZHTGg1Z0s3cS02V0ZUZl9ubHpnZEVLUWZO0gGaAUFVX3lxTE9ZMHVIaDJTWVB0VWRYWGpMQ1hDcXF1M3A3ZE1iU2pmRzlFOVlzWlhLdUhkUm9BZU1SSXhfZTBYME00V0ZyMm1XdVJlUzdpM1pYZmcwQ2c5VFozZUlMYXR0VnRac0RnZmVMNjM1LXN4bVNCbnN1MU9LNGFhZ0d1cWpJaHluRWZMRE1aR2hSdUR3SnhCX04zRjk1ZFE?oc=5\">source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Watch CBS News Updated on: July 25, 2025 \/ 11:33 AM EDT \/ CBS News Balmedie, Scotland&nbsp;&mdash; President Trump is due to arrive in Scotland Friday for a four-day private trip &mdash; his first to the U.K since he was re-elected. The White House says he&#8217;ll meet during his visit with Prime Minister Keir Starmer [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":158296,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-158295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-us","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158295"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158295\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/158296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}