Earlier this week, Reform leader and past its sell-by-date tin of spam Nigel Farage was once again being a bastion of free speech. However, instead of actually representing his constituency of Clacton and indeed his so-called party at the first Prime Ministers Questions (PMQs) back of the new session, he was speaking at the US congress, for some reason.
He was there giving evidence to a US congressional committee hearing into whether European laws “threaten Americans’ right to speak freely in the US”, of course, they could’ve asked any manner of expert into online safety or free speech lawyers, but the republicans don’t believe in experts.
Bastion of free speech, Nigel Farage
At PMQs, Starmer said Farage had “flown to America to badmouth and talk down our country”.
He said:
He has gone there to lobby the Americans to impose sanctions on this country that will harm working people.
But Farage denied that he was recommending the US impose sanctions on the UK, but that he wanted American politicians and companies to have “honest conversations” about free speech with the UK.
In his diatribe at the US congress, he drew attention to notorious TERF Graham Linehan’s arrest saying:
This could happen to any American man or woman that goes to Heathrow that has said things online that the British government and British police don’t like.
At what point did we become North Korea?
What Farage neglected to disclose, however, was that Linehan wasn’t arrested for having an opinion, he was arrested because his opinion was “you should all go and punch someone you believe to be from a minority that I’ve decided are a danger to women”.
He also, predictably, criticised the short-lived jail sentence of Lucy Connolly, who incited people to set fire to a hotel during the riots, and the online safety bill which protects the kids his party claims to want to protect from child sexual abuse.
Congress rips Farage a new one
But after his evidence, the committee then got their hands on him, and it was fucking glorious.
New York Congressman Jerry Nadler rightly asked why the committee had invited “a fringe politician from the United Kingdom”, and Georgia Congressman Hank Johnson piled in too, getting Farage to confirm that Reform currently only has four MPs in parliament.
Johnson also accused Farage of only caring about so that he could free speech so he could get in with tech supervillain Elon Musk, telling Farage “you’re trying to ingratiate yourself with the tech bros.”
He also got right to the root of why he was brown-nosing Elon:
You need money from Elon Musk in order to get elected prime minister of Great Britain. That’s the bottom line.
Farage denied this, basically saying Musk hated him, lol.
Enter: congressman Raskin
But it was Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin that really tore Farage a new one, pointing out that if he really was worried about the Online Safety Act, he could’ve had ample time to make his case in our own parliament on the same day:
He should go and advance the positions he’s taking here in Congress today in parliament, which is meeting today, if he’s serious about it
Raskin also asked him why he’d called for a pro-Gaza protest to be banned, Farage gave the ridiculous answer that it would’ve been near Flag shagging Christmas – Remembrance Sunday – and therefore a “sensitive time”.
Raskin replied to this:
I thought that’s what the freedom of speech was about. You have a right to engage in speech that other people consider offensive or insensitive.
Farage was also pulled up by Raskin over the Reform-run Nottinghamshire County Council banning local news outlet Nottinghamshire Live. Last month, Reform refused to send press releases about events or speak to journalists from those outlets, who had been critical of the council. Nottinghamshire Live were initially told they would be banned from speaking to all Notts County councillors, but council leader Mick Barton denied this.
Raskin asked Farage:
Why do you ban journalists who oppose your views from coming to your events? Why did you tell your party… why did you tell the local government not to do interviews with your local newspaper?
Farage denied that his party had ever banned journalists and called himself the “most open person to any journalist”.
Raskin highlights all the way Farage has free speech
Raskin finally twisted the knife in with his closing speech, which is a thing of absolute beauty:
There is a free speech crisis in America today, but there’s no free speech crisis in Britain, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has not shut down GB News where Mr Farage his own show just because Mr Farage has used his airtime to call for banning peaceful protest that he disagrees with.
“No one has stopped him from appearing on Russian TV seventeen times and repeating that the one world political leader he most admired was Vladimir Putin even though Vladimir Putin is a war criminal and a dictator who has regularly interfered in other countries democratic elections
He continued:
No one has stopped Mr Farage from parroting Putin’s absurd talking points like when Farage claimed that NATO, the US and Britain provoked this war in Ukraine. For a man who fashions himself as some kind of a free speech martyr, Mr Farage seems most at home with the autocrats and dictators of the world who are crushing freedom on earth.
A warning to the UK
He finished with a stark warning for those in the UK who are falling for Farage’s baccy-stained hollow sentiments:
To the people of the UK who think this Putin-loving free speech impostor and Trump sycophant will protect freedom in this country: come on over to America and see what Trump and Maga are doing to destroy our freedom.
Kidnap college students off the street, ban books from our libraries militarise our police and unleash them against our communities, takeover our universities wreck our professional civil service and and turn the government into a money making machine for trump and his family.
You might think twice before you let Mr Farage make Britain great again.
Why aren’t British Journalists doing the same?
The reason it was so glorious to watch Farage be knocked down a peg or two is that it never happens over here. Those few minutes of questioning and analysis by Congressman Raskin were harsher treatment than Farage has had in his years of media interviews and supposed scrutiny by parliament. Despite constantly appearing on breakfast news and Question Time, nobody has eviscerated him so severely and laid out just how damaging he is.
By constantly covering every single bowel movement via the mouth that Farage makes, the British media is only giving him the attention he wants. By not scrutinising and fact checking his increasingly dangerous statements, the media are only making him appeal more and more to an electorate that sees nothing ever changing under Labour the same way it didn’t under the Tories.
Unless the media learns from this, has the balls to take a stand against Farage, report the danger of the claims him and his party are making, and hold him to account, they will be complicit in Reform gains.
The corporate media in the UK faces a lot of criticism for being overwhelmingly right wing, to the point if the media isn’t opposing the creep of fascism, it’s ushering it in.
Featured image via the Canary
