Politics
Reform go full white supremacy with new proposal
Anti-extremism campaign group Hope Not Hate just released its latest State of Hate report. The annual review details far-right activity in the UK over the previous year. And, quite predictably, things are not looking good for opponents of fascism and the extremist right.
State of Hate deals with the many facets of far-right activity, from anti-migrant and anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment to race science and conspiracy theorists. However, among details on Elon Musk’s election meddling and rising ethnonationalism, one stat really stood out.
The majority of Reform UK members now support the forcing or incentivising non-white British citizens to leave the UK.
It’s easy to read that sentence without letting it sink in. It’s talking about a desire to rid the UK of Black and brown British people, specifically because of the colour of their skin.
That’s open, plain-as-day white supremacy and ethnonationalism. And it’s a belief held by the majority of members of a now-mainstream UK political party.
Reform bring white supremacy in the mainstream
Ethnonationalism is an extreme position. Even amongst dedicated leftists, people reading that statistic might be tempted to look for a ‘soft’ interpretation. ‘We know Reform members oppose immigration – maybe it’s that (xenophobic) motivation behind the statistic, rather than race?’
State of Hate specifies that, among Reform party members:
Over half (54%) think non-white British citizens born abroad should be forcibly removed or encouraged to leave, compared to 24% if the citizens are white.
One in five (22%) think non-white British citizens whose parents were born in the UK should be forcibly removed or encouraged to leave, compared to just 7% if they are white.
To put that another way, over half of Reform members want UK citizens who weren’t born here out of the country. 30% of Reform members think that only if the individual in question is Black or brown.
Likewise, a startling number of Reform members still want to drive out second-generation citizens. And again, 15% of party members think that if, and only if, that citizen is Black or brown.
Farage, Lowe and Robinson
Beyond this, State of Hate also reported on the electoral chances of Reform, and how its rivals on the far right affected its chances. In particular, it highlighted that:
Two thirds of Reform UK party members have a positive view of Rupert Lowe, who recently launched his rival Restore Britain party, and 61% like Tommy Robinson.
The fact that most Reformers also love the even-further-right Rupert Lowe is hardly a surprise. Reform has been hemorrhaging its councillors to the new extremist ‘party’ for weeks now.
Likewise, after seeing the 150,000-strong ‘Unite the Kingdom’ hate march last year, the racist party’s support for Robinson isn’t exactly a shock. However, the support for the hate march was disgustingly high across society as a whole:
Our most recent polling shows worrying levels of support for Tommy Robinson’s Unite the Kingdom movement amongst the general public; 26% of the public view the Unite the Kingdom rally positively, rising to almost 50% among men aged 25-34.
In 2025, we tracked 251 anti-migrant protests. Whilst many protestors were hardened far-right activists with histories of violence, others were local people with no formal connections to the broader movement.
White supremacy has always festered within the heart of the UK. We are a nation built on the violent subjugation of Black and brown people, fuelled by the persistent belief that whiteness is a significant factor of Britishness.
Whilst that ideology has inflected a huge proportion of our politics, it often took the form of dog-whistle allusions and half-voiced sentiment.
Now, however, that mask has slipped. White ethnonationalism is increasingly overt, bold, and mainstream. It’s supporters make up the majority of the UK’s most popular political party.
We must recognise this racist bile for what it is. It is our duty to call it out, and to eliminate it from our communities and our politics.
This is not how fascism begins – we’re long past that point now.
Featured image via the Canary