Nigel Farage faces ethics investigation as Reform U.K. encounters election setbacks

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“It’s really helpful to people like Nigel Farage to have the Keir and Rachel show carrying on,” according to Survation’s Damian Lyons-Lowe, who said Starmer and his Chancellor of the Exchequer, Rachel Reeves, had appeared “elitist” to many voters — a useful foil for the man-of-the-people image that Farage, a former metals trader, likes to project.

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“With an Andy Burnham government, you get a chance of there being a re-branding of the Labour Party,” Lyons-Lowe said, which will force competitors to find fresh attack lines.

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Farage has remained active on social media, but he is being eclipsed in views by Burnham, who’ll become U.K. prime minister on July 20 should he remain unopposed. He has also been visiting allies in the U.S., posting a picture with U.S. Vice President JD Vance on Saturday with the caption: “Celebrating the relationship between Britain and America.”

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Allies rallied around the beleaguered Reform U.K. leader this week, after a series of articles scrutinizing his finances and compliance with ethics codes prompted him to all but disappear from public view.

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Conservative defector Danny Kruger, now Reform’s head of preparations for government, said in a post on X that articles about Farage’s £5 million “gift” from a Thailand-based donor and undeclared properties were an attempt by “established power” to “disable” the right-wing party.

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Reform’s business spokesman Richard Tice called the reports “desperate,” while Raheem Kassam, a former adviser, alleged there was a “Ukraine link behind all the recent, sudden, alarmist anti-Farage activity.”

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There have been signs of dissent within Reform’s ranks. David Bull, who was the party’s chairman until May, said in a recent interview that, “as a friend and colleague” of Farage, he thought the leader should take “a break” from politics amid scrutiny over the Harborne money.

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In an interview with the BBC late last month — one of the rare times that Farage has recently submitted himself to media questions — the politician appeared tetchy when asked about Harborne’s £5 million donation, saying “it’s not the public’s business” to know how he spent it. He has cancelled appearances on other BBC shows.

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While he did take questions at an event ahead of the Makerfield by-election last month, most of the national press were not invited.

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Labour MPs have raised questions about Farage’s £4 million property portfolio, which he mostly acquired in cash. While MPs are supposed to declare any properties they own, the Reform leader has only listed two of at least five houses, according to Land Registry documents obtained by the Times.

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Reform told the paper his declarations are within the rules because one undeclared property is owned entirely by his partner, another is occupied by his daughter, while the third is owned through his company Thorn in the Side Ltd — although Farage has declared another property owned by his company, and other MPs list properties owned through corporate entities.

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— With assistance from Mumbi Gitau.

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