It’s officially over. Today, the United Kingdom struck a serious blow to what President Donald Trump called the “false song of globalism” and began the messy divorce proceedings with the European Union.
From now on, it’s Britain for the British — and Trump supporters are cheering the move.
The UK submitted their papers to leave the EU Wednesday, overturning four decades of globalism, demolishing the notion that EU expansion is inevitable and shaking the foundations of a bloc that is facing challenges to its identity and its place in the world.
Britain’s top envoy to the EU, Tim Barrow, hand-delivered a letter to European Council President Donald Tusk formally triggering a two-year countdown to the final split.
“Today the government acts on the democratic will of the British people,” Prime Minister Theresa May told lawmakers in the House of Commons, adding, “This is a historic moment from which there can be no turning back.”
For Britons who voted 52 to 48 percent to leave the bloc in a referendum nine months ago, it was a time for celebration.
“I voted for Brexit and today is the day that vote starts to count,” said Charles Goodacre, a former taxi driver, in the northern England city of Sunderland. “Things have been bad round here for a while and we needed a change. There’s been a lot of arguments about what happened but we can now get on with it.”
Former U.K. Independence Party leader Nigel Farage, who campaigned for years to take Brexit from fringe cause to reality, said Britain had passed “the point of no return.”
“I can still, to be honest with you, scarcely believe today has come,” he said.
May’s six-page letter to Tusk was polite and conciliatory, stressing that Britons want to remain “committed partners and allies to our friends across the continent.”
She said the two sides should “engage with one another constructively and respectfully, in a spirit of sincere cooperation.”
But there was a hint of steel in May’s assertion that without a good deal, “our cooperation in the fight against crime and terrorism would be weakened.” That could be seen by some in Europe as a threat to withdraw British cooperation on crime and counterterrorism if the U.K. does not get its way.
The loss of a major member is destabilizing for the EU, which is battling to contain a tide of nationalist and populist sentiment and faces unprecedented antipathy from the new resident of the White House.
The two sides now have until March 2019 to agree on a divorce settlement and — if possible — establish a new relationship between Britain, the world’s fifth-largest economy, and the EU, a vast single market stretching over 27 countries.
Tusk said he will respond by Friday with a draft negotiating guidelines for the remaining 27 member states to consider. Leaders of those nations will meet April 29 to finalize their negotiating platform before instructing the EU’s chief negotiator, French diplomat Michel Barnier.
Talks between Barnier and his British counterpart, Brexit Secretary David Davis, are likely to start in the second half of May. Barnier on Wednesday tweeted a group photo with the words “Our #Brexit team is ready. We will work for #EU27 member states, EU institutions & citizens; together with all Commission services.”
As in many divorces, the first area of conflict is likely to be money. The EU wants Britain to pay a hefty bill — Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the EU’s executive Commission, put it at around 50 billion euros ($63 billion) — to cover pension liabilities for EU staff and other commitments the U.K. has agreed to.
Britain acknowledges it will have to pay something, but is sure to quibble over the size of the tab.
Negotiations will also soon hit a major contraction: Britain wants “frictionless” free trade, but says it will restore control of immigration, ending the right of EU citizens to live and work in Britain. The EU says Britain can’t have full access to the single market if it doesn’t accept free movement, one of the bloc’s key principles.
Both Britain and the EU say a top priority will be guaranteeing the rights of 3 million EU citizens living in Britain, and 1 million Britons living elsewhere in the bloc.
The two sides also appear to disagree on how the talks will unfold. EU officials say the divorce terms must be settled before negotiators can turn to the U.K.’s future relationship with the bloc — and a deal on that could take a decade. British officials want the two things discussed simultaneously.
May conceded Wednesday that there would have to be a “phased process of implementation” once the two years are up.
May has suggested that if talks stall she could walk away, saying that “no deal for Britain is better than a bad deal for Britain.” If Britain crashed out of the EU without a trade deal it would simply fall back onto World Trade Organization rules.
It’s a major blow to the EU, after decades of expansion, to lose one of its largest members. Anti-EU populists including French far-right leader Marine Le Pen hope the impulses that drove Britain to turn its back on the EU will be repeated across the continent.
The Associated Press contributed to this article.