They shot him, lied about it and called him a terrorist

It is four minutes after ten and it is hard to know where to start. Um this might sound a little flippant given the gravity of the situation, but imagine if you were charged. With concocting. A story or an event that was designed to discover whether or not there was any point at which somebody would detach themselves. from a fascist project, from a fascist administration. I I mean if you actually had to come up with the details.

Tragically, the murder of um Rene Nicole Good was not enough because I think it was um and and remember we're trying to get into the minds of people who have been sympathetic so far to the fascism. Um and and Renee Nicolgood was um married to a woman. I think she had dyed hair. Uh she s described herself as a poet. I forgive me for putting it like that. She was a poet.

Um but the fact that she described herself as a poet allowed people to snigger and sneer. And so when she was murdered by a um a member of ICE, uh i i it it kind of lent itself um that e an any threat, any peril whatsoever was motivating the behaviour of the man who murdered her. But you could watch that footage and find just enough to cling on to. So you'll remember, we sat here and we said The party told you to ignore the evidence of your eyes and ears.

It was their final most terrible command. And we watched it happen in real time. We watched and listened to people pretending that they could not see what we could see, that they could not see what they could see, and that they could somehow cobble together a case For self defense or provocation or whatever it may be. And and and there was just enough.

フェリー People thus far sympathetic to or warm towards the fascism, the racism, the misogyny, the climate change denial, whichever it was, whatever part of that holy trinity it was that most appealed to somebody who wouldn't come out and describe horrors as horrors. There was just enough for them to pretend, wasn't there? Just enough for them to sort of set And I'm talking um about people right up to the top of the United up to and including the president

Of the United States of America. And and you need to bear that in mind, because the questions that we're going to ask this morning are not as easy to answer as you might originally think. For the very simple reason that this goes all the way to the to the very top of The White House.

And then you come to the events of this weekend. Y you come to the murder in cold blood and broad daylight of a man who was doing absolutely nothing wrong. Um except trying to protect a woman who was being brutalized by ICE agents. And and what I meant earlier when I suggested that you could concoct a story. Designed to find out whether or not people really would put up with anything, whether people really would look the other way.

Pretti. Thirty seven year old. And an intensive care unit nurse I know this shouldn't matter, um but it does. That's the nature of the species, that's what we do. Um An intensive care unit nurse. who worked specifically and exclusively with military veterans. There are hospitals in the United States of America that are dedicated to veterans, VA.

Oswpitals, Veterans Affairs, and it is a kind of way that you sidestep the fact that I haven't got an NHS, and that if you have done military service you kind of get looked after health-wise in ways that other members of the population don't. And that was his job. That was his job working in a in a veterans affairs hospital's intensive care unit. Providing in some cases end of life care to people who had been prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice in the service of the United States of America.

They murdered. an intensive care nurse who worked exclusively with military veterans and and I think some of their dependents, in broad daylight, And then they called him a terrorist, who

I I I mean, you know, how many times have I said to you in the last month, year that we have to have a hyperbole alarm in the back of our heads? And you have this normality bias as well. It's a phrase we've used a lot. I I I think that the academics call it a normalcy bias. But you have this thing in your head that keeps telling you It can't be as bad as it looks because this is the West, this is the United States, this is the United Kingdom.

I include the United Kingdom because so many members of our media and political class have been very warm towards. I think Farage and Badenock even want an ICE type project to unfold here. State sanctioned murderers roaming the streets of Britain looking for people who are a bit too brown. Well, we know there are members of Faragist Party who'd love that. She'd probably start with the ones in adverts, stick them on a list, and hunt them down.

But you you you have this hyperbole. See that was hyperbole for now, but nothing hyperbolical. hyperbolic about the first bit of this paragraph. The bit about the intensive care unit nurse who worked in a Veterans Affairs hospital and was murdered in broad daylight by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Officers. I don't think that anybody Unsheltered or uncamouflaged.

by status and power can do what they did to Rene Nicole Good and pretend that there are two sides to this story. I really don't. I d I d I I I I don't want you to watch the footage, because you will never forget it. Um but if you have already you will know that there are no two sides to this story. Although you wouldn't know that from looking at much of the coverage, including the BBC's online coverage yesterday, which talked about conflicting accounts.

As journalists, if somebody says it's raining, is to stick our head out of the window and see if it gets wet. And if it doesn't, guess what? It's not raining. Conflicting accounts. So for me one of the first things that struck me was that difference between and it's a it's just a consequence I think of this mad job that I've got. It was the consequence I think. of this job that made me start thinking about coverage a little bit earlier than a normal person would.

Maybe that's not true. Maybe you were immediately outraged by the evidence of murder. followed fast upon by the slander, the libel, of terrorist, of an ICU nurse who dedicated his working life to looking after military veterans. Um

And I don't know what happens next. I d I don't know so if if you think about the murder of Rene Nicole Good as a massive fracture. in the infrastructure of reality, reporting reality. A massive fracture. But d but not a complete breach. You could still just about intellectually process the people who were pretending to believe that there was a case for her murder, a case for her killing. You could still just about okay, well that's she was in a car.

And a car is b uh you know, a car is is is a big and heavy thing. Um she wasn't posing any threat to anybody and she was trying to get away, but you could pretend otherwise, you could claim otherwise. That's a fracture in what I would call the the the the the framework of reporting reality. Because they had to report. We had to report, all the people pretending otherwise.

And then you come to Alex Pretti. I'm just gonna play you something before we carry on. I d I don't know what question I'm exactly that I am gonna ask you yet, but I I want first to to play you a video that was taken in December of twenty twenty four.

And this is Alex Petty, described by Donald Trump's administration as a domestic terrorist after their own uh immigration and customs enforcement agents murdered him in cold blood in broad daylight. This is him reading a final salute. for a US veteran called Terence Lee Randolph, something which I presume he's called upon to do on a relatively regular basis. And this is what I mean when I talk about the story almost being being designed To help everybody else discover who is so broken and sick.

and debased and bigoted that they still won't recognise or they still won't condemn because they can't not recognise it now. They still won't won't condemn what they're watching. Terrence Lee Randolph, March 30th, 1947, December 10th, 2024. Today we remember that freedom is not free. We have to work at it, nurture it, protect it, and even sacrifice for it. May we never forget.

forget and always remember our brothers and sisters who have served so that we may enjoy the gift of freedom. So in this moment we remember and give thanks for their dedication and selfless service to our nation in the cause of our freedom. In this solemn hour, We rend him our honor and our gratitude. Thank you. Alex Pretti there reading the um the the final honours, I think is the technical term for a veteran that he cared for as an ICU nurse. Today we remember that freedom is not free.

We have to work at it, even sacrifice for it. Um I have a a statement also from his parents that I'll share with you shortly. And and this is the man that they have called a a domestic terrorist. This is the man that Christine Nohm uh lied about. I mean lied about.

in in in broad daylight on live television. Blatant and obvious lies. And I I it's it's almost like every question I've ever asked you about this descent into fascism. is simultaneously redundant and requiring that I ask you again. U you can't pretend anymore. Having a little look at what the Daily Mail is doing because it is so bent and and and so morally bankrupt and and so disgusting.

Y you you just have this a absolutely extraordinary inability. That's why I keep mentioning the list of things that that that sit alongside Donald Trump, although he now obviously um uh deserves a category all of his own, but all the things they've been wrong about, hideously wrong, whether it's Brexit or Boris Johnson or Liztruss or austerity, they haven't admitted that they've been wrong about any of it and they of course have been massive cheerleaders

for Donald Trump, up to and including their star columnist Dick Littlejohn last week, wishing out loud in print that Donald Trump was in charge here, the man whose administration murders nurses and then describes them as terrorists. Yeah, lots of that, please. Warts and all. Um was he a threat or was he shot dead after his gun was taken, is the question mark.

Um is what's it Q Twain? Do you remember that little craze a few years ago on the Inspe i Internet c questions to which the answer is no. Q T W A I N You don't ask questions about this. It would be a bit like asking a question about whether or not the sun came up this morning in your town, whether or not um w I don't know, actually I will stick with that, whether or not the sun came up, whether or not um water quenches your thirst.

Uh w whether or not hot things burn. I and d was he a threat? And then someone called Freddie Gray, the deputy editor of The Spectator, who I don't know, and and I don't want to speak ill of People I'm not overly familiar with, but if this clown hasn't used the phrase Trump derangement syndrome, then I would be very, very surprised. These brutalized killings will only serve to validate claims Trump is turning the US into a fascist state. Just think about.

It's not these brutalised killings prove that Trump is turning the US into a fascist state, which is what anybody honest and decent or hadn't spent a significant part of the last twelve months or or or even ten years pretending that Trump was anything other than monstrous. You don't go for him. You don't go for Trump. You you somehow turn it into a a a a piece about Those of us who have been describing Trump's fascism for, in many cases, years now, not just one year.

But from the very start, and if not from the start, then from the January the sixth incited insurrection and the subsequent pardoning of the violent criminals who undertook it. So

It it it's probably I don't know, we'll find out actually, a consequence of my job. But how how should this be covered? I I'm not gonna criticise uh Newsreaders and and news broadcasters. The the newspapers are different. They put headlines on things. They're bent. They're corrupt. Um, you don't have to be following events in in in courtrooms, um, up and down the country over the last few years to to get an an an idea of how these

institutions and individuals have behaved in the past. Um but y you don't Look at them when you're looking for the truth. These are the people that told you Liz Truss was a genius, that Brexit would be brilliant, that Boris Johnson was a stand up guy, that Nigel Farage is someone you can trust to clear up the mess he did more than almost anybody else to create.

Uh the Daily Mail was was was Schilling for Hitler in the nineteen thirties and the owner was the grandfather of the current owner was corresponding with with the the the top highest Nazi command. But what the heck do the rest of us do? What should I I mean I'm not, as you know, a big, big BBC basher. But what should the BBC be doing? When there are no conflicting versions of events? There is the truth.

And then there is what Trump's administration is saying. They are two completely contradictory phenomena. This is why I started reminding you of Rene Nicole Good, because there was just enough there just enough there to sustain the the myth. You know? Uh Alex Pretti was was carrying a a legally held handgun, as lots and lots of Americans do, which he hadn't drawn, uh which they've lied about.

Um one of the ICE agents removed it and after it was removed another ICE agent shot him five times. So I I mean they tried and they have tried, but it isn't gonna work because we can all see what happened. There isn't enough room for the liars to manoeuvre. They don't have a sixpence to turn on in the way that they did with Rene Nicole Good.

But when you ha and this is why I said to you you need to keep in the back of your mind The fact that it goes all the way up to Donald Trump, who if you weren't following events, didn't apologise for maligning every single um uh British m member of the military who who died in Afghanistan but did sort of climb back a little bit on those disgusting comments that we spent all of Friday's show examining.

And because there's no room to manoeuvre, there's no sixpence to turn on, there's no um space for the lies, this is the bigger moment. Do you know how self indulgent I am sometimes? I this one really got me. It really got me, this one. What the more I found out about him, the more

unable I was to process what I was feeling. Because I don't know what you do. I I'd do that thing. I d what would you do, man? What would you do if it happened here? What would you do if Cammy Badenoch or Nigel Farage actually had their ICE agents marching through British streets murdering nurses? And then lying about them and calling them terrorists.

What would you actually do? Because what he did was so brave, so courageous. He wasn't there by accident. He wasn't there to observe, he was there to object. And and he knew the risks he was taking and he and he died protecting somebody else, protecting a woman.

And they murdered him and they lied about it and they called him a terrorist. And because it goes all the way to the White House The media establishment, and I use that as a descriptive term, not as a pejorative term, the media establishment has to report what they're saying. It has to report what they're saying as if it might be valid. We haven't got a system in place and and w w the same is true here in many ways.

How how do you do how do you deal with a world in which the biggest liars hold the most power? How do you actually do that? How do you deal with that? Because I don't know. I can do this because I am free. in the context of the UK media, to speak truth to power and to and to tell you the truth. If I had spent any of the last few years using the phrase Trump derangement syndrome to describe um those of us who have been describing and and predicting this for years now.

I don't know what the hell I would do, to be honest with you, but I probably would have told you to vote for Brexit. I'd have spent years tickling Boris Johnson's toes, I'd have been joking about what a great guy Donald Trump is, and I'll have Nigel Farage on the show next week. to uh um to to to give him a haircut. So I I I probably would be untouched and untroubled by what that would mean. But for the rest of us who care

What do you do when the lies are this egregious? And and I I don't know. Is it a question about what should journalists do? How how should the media report how does the media how should the media report? Fascism. O three four four four four four four five six oh six zero nine seven three. How should the how should the media respond when the lies Go to the very, very top. When the lies are as blatant as this, what should reporters report?

'When the lies are as blatant as this, what should reporters report? Hit the numbers now, you will get through. Twenty six minutes after ten. This is again I I I mean arguably a bit flippant. But what do you do now? Do you wait until he invades Poland?

Or do you acknowledge that this is fascism, pure and simple, in plain sight, getting worse, not better every single day? And and if it is, then what do we do? What's the precedent? I I mean you can report on uh coup d'etat in in far off countries. You can report on uh totalitarian regimes like like Putin's. But if it's happening in the United States, what what should

What should the journalists do, actually? I've talked a lot about what Keir Starmer should do, what politicians should do, but America is is careering at a hundred kilometers an hour. down the path to fascism. In fact it's there. What on earth should journalists be doing, both here and there, on both sides of the Atlantic? I'cause I don't know, as you can tell this morning. I don't know. Uh Antui's in Prague in the Czech Republic. Antui, what would you like to say?

Hi James. Thanks for having me. First I'll be really short. Uh revolution. There's there's no other way in the US how to get through this. Or convince somehow for the Democrats and at least part of the Republicans to pull their

heads out of their behinds and start doing something about it. Invoke the twenty fifth, do something about it. What would that mean? Remember uh th th I I I have an A level in American politics, but not all my listeners do, so just remind us what invoking the twenty fifth means. So twenty fifth amendment, if a president is not able or capable of performing his duties because of uh behavioral issues, so he's con uh he he's uh mixing up gr Greenland and Iceland. He's uh saying that uh people

Yes sir. I mean I mean do they do the Republicans think that everything will go in their hand? That everything will be perfect and fine for their party if they go their way? I already said uh th there are two things. So I'm from Philly. I'm from a city where we don't mess around. uh already the Black Panther Party is re establishing there.

is number one, which is crazy to me because I'm not sure. Do you not think that people like Steven Miller and and I I d uh I mean he's clearly got a a brain that functions. I don't know if you can say that about many other members of the I J D Vance. Stephen Miller and J D Vance would love More violence on the streets. I mean Trump if if if Simon Marx's theory is correct.

And it's going to be increasingly hard to argue with that he doesn't want mi he doesn't want midterms and he wants to be able to concoct and claim but then but then your y your course of action would give him what he's hoping for. Listen, but what is happening in Minnesota is actually a preparation for uh uh taking away the midterms. There's not gonna be any elections. Uh because what they're doing in Minnesota is a preparation for uh what they want to do in all the

cities across the US in the U.S. But that's how fascism works. That's how fascism is and we always think historically that fascism must have been violently and furiously resisted at every turn. But it's ushered in, mate. It's cheered in. That's the problem. We sit here being disgusted, being publicly disgusted and publicly outraged, and it's a sincere, authentic reaction and yours will be much more powerful or even more powerful than mine because you're American.

But um but there are people there who who who will be falling for the lies. Or and this is the bit that frightens me most and that I haven't got the vocabulary yet to properly analyse, I can process people who are falling for the lies. I can't cro process the people who actually really love this stuff. And there must be millions of them, man. There must be millions of them.

Why does Trump still have thirty percent approval rating or thirty to forty percent, I don't know, d depending on the polls? Because there's still a part that loves this that they really want to change the status of the thing. Rydyn ni'n gwneud rhywbeth sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n?

Rene Nicole, good you could just about, if you wanted to, persuade yourself that it wasn't as bad as everybody was saying it was. You can't really do that here. Um i you know, th the con the the handgun, which I I mean you could describe as concealed, but you need to understand American gun laws to realise why that's really not a big deal. Um might give some people in this country the chance

to pretend that it's not as awful as as you and I are describing it as. But Americans aren't, with your history of gun culture, with the role that the National Rifle Association plays in the right to bear arms, there's no earthly way that this is gonna stand because everyone can watch, everyone can see.

What happened? So what we don't know, if there's five of these, ten of these, a hundred of these, do things change? Because if they don't change after one, how confident can you be that they'll change after one hundred? That's the thing. That's the thing we don't know. That's not a phone in question. I mean you can have a crack at it.

Yep. But you call not really I'll I'll leave it to the rest of the uh the audience that will be calling in. What t one more thing please. Of course. I wanted to call in Friday for what Trump said about NATO. Yes. Uh half Czech, half American, have both citizenships. Uh I have friends that served uh in the Czech army, uh actually eleven and a half thousand deployed into Afghanistan, uh twenty six wounded, fourteen dead.

uh even the Czech Prime Minister who is right now in the middle. He the Czech Republic is trying to figure out do we go with the US or do we stay with the European Union because we have uh aeroskepticism a new Prime Minister? uh even he called out that this is hideous and that th th he shouldn't have said this and I don't know if it matters. This is this is the thing that today's show is about so far. I hadn't realised it in that interminable introduction.

But it it is about actually trying to work out what the new rules are because all the old rules just got broken. And i if you think they were broken before, I I'm here. I believe you, I a and and you might be right, but I I would say fractured, fatally fractured previously, and then on Saturday absolutely destroyed.

And no one knows how to report that. When all the rules are broken, when everything has been d how do you rep how do you report it? Let alone respond, which is the question Anthony chose to answer, and which you can answer to Um and what do you say about the thirty odd percent of people who who still approve of Donald Trump?

Are they fascists? O three four four four four four five six oh six oh nine seven three'cause I'll say it again, fascist regimes do not fight their way to power every time. They are they are cheered and applauded all the way up the um All the way up the s central streets of the of the capital cities. Sometimes. Ten thirty three is the time. Dominic Ellis has your headline.

Ten thirty six is the time. Um the Trump administration is facing pressure to launch a full investigation into the second Minneapolis killing by federal agents in two weeks. As one Republican governor says enough is enough. The US President's told the Wall Street Journal that his administration is quotes reviewing everything, end quotes, and also indicates he could eventually withdraw agents from the city, but he's given no timeframe.

Rydw i'n ei wneud yw'r hynny. Rydw i'n ei wneud yw'r hynny. Rydw i'n ei wneud ymwneud hynny. Rydw i'n ei wneud ymwneud hynny. Rydw i'n ei wneud ymwneud hynny. Rydw i'n ei wneud ymwneud hynny. There is no regret in the administration. If there was, they wouldn't have lied about Alex Pretti. And there is absolutely no sense of revulsion or horror at what happened. The murder in broad daylight of an ICU nurse who dedicated his working life to looking after military veterans.

The president of course is a draft dodger. I can tell you that if there is pushback here, if enough Republicans find enough courage, if that's the right word to use, conscience perhaps is better, to make a little bit of a fuss, then there may be a gesture. weak justice. The th the officers or the officers involved may be um cautioned, dismissed. According to some reports, they're already back on duty, which is unheard of.

in almost any country, certainly in any democracy, when an officer is involved in the killing of a civilian. But that that that there is not going to be a change of course. They're not going to suddenly go, Oh my goodness me, we seem to have turned into fascists. we better have a big change and a bit of a rethink. Th th these things are incremental.

These are exercises in boiling frogs. And if the the the people watching get a little bit jumpy or if the frog looks like hopping out of the pot, they might temporarily pause. They might temporarily turn it down. But it's been quite clear for some time that this was on the cards, and it's crystal clear now because they murdered a nurse and called him a terrorist. It gets no worse than that.

The quality of that corruption is complete. You cannot have a more corrupt moment, partly because of what Alex did for a living, partly because of what he stood for. Partly because of what we know about him, and partly because of how he died, but mostly because of how they lied afterwards.

The quality of that corruption is complete. The only thing that changes or can change now is the quantity. You cannot have a more corrupt moment, a more fascistic moment than the murder in broad daylight of a nurse who looked after military veterans, followed incredibly quickly by the lie, the slanderous lie that he was a terrorist, and the instruction to the public to ignore the evidence of their eyes and ears. You know I've got a hyperbole alarm, and you know it beeps a lot.

But this isn't one of those moments, it's not beeping now. The quality of this corruption is absolutely complete. So I was trying to touch on with Antry because all that changes now is the quantity. You have five murders like this, ten murders like this, twenty murders like this, fifty murders like this, and I don't know where people's pivot points are. Oh, I can live with one.

Um, she was a lesbian, perhaps, might be how these people live with themselves or lie straight in bed at night. Or I can live with another. Um Oh Crikey, he was a nurse who looked after military veterans. Can I live with that?'Cause if you can live with that Altyazı M.K. These false patriots. You know? The US equivalent of people who are polluting your local roundabout with tatty flags, these pretend patriots. If they can put up with this.

They can put up with anything. And and we're still left with the question of what they get in return. They get a validation of their racism, they get a validation of their misogyny and they get a validation of their climate change denial. There's nothing else on the table. There never has been and there never will be. But if they can put up with this, they can put up with anything. So what the hell does everybody else do in the meantime?

Hi James. Hi. Um I have to collect my thoughts. I'll take a time. I am a teacher of elementary students in Minneapolis. Um, my students are English language learners and so all of my students are immigrants. Um my school is three blocks away from where Alex Pre was murdered. Um I I think I want what I wanna say is that I'm here to let people know,'cause I know you have listeners all around the world, that I'm trying to cut through the lies. And I as soon as this happened on Saturday morning

The reaction was another person's been murdered and my second reaction is, How are they gonna spin this one? Especially after seeing the video. with my own eyes of what happened and knowing that they're gonna make something up. Of how it was justified when in plain sight there was no justification for murdering that man.

'Cause they have to, right? They they have to lie. And what's the alternative? They d if they if they if they lie about Rene Nicole Good, they have to lie about Alex Pretti. And the and the next one, and the one after that, and the one after that. They have to lie. That's the bit that's new, I think, for me at least. I uh maybe not for you.

Well, and you know, you have to remember that I've all I mean, I we I've also been through George Floyd and the uprising and that was all lies as well about the situation and it continues to be lies. about that, that, you know, there's so many people who say that he was not murdered by Derek Chauvin. It was a drug overdose. So we're so the people in Minneapolis are used to being told lies about what we know because we're here and we live it.

And so I'm just I just want people to understand that you can't you can't if you see Christy Gnome or Greg Bovino going up and speaking to people, none of it is true. and that the things that are happening here are gonna move on to other places and I'm telling you, I never in my life imagined that things would be the way they are in a place where I live. That the families that I work with of my students cannot leave their homes. They literally cannot leave their homes. We have

Teachers and neighbors who have to go pick kids up because the ice vehicles are roaming around the neighborhood. They're sitting outside apartment buildings where it's known that immigrants live. We have to deliver groceries to them. We had to deliver Christmas presents because the parents can't leave. And so I just want people to be aware that this is the state of Minneapolis right now and and just when you think it's not gonna get worse, it probably will.

I i I'm fully expecting that Trump won is going to bring in military troops and we will be a police state.

Well he's talked about the um eighteen oh seven Insurrection Act, hasn't he? Which would entitle him to flood Minneapolis with with with more force. So those of us who a flirted with the word fascism in recent months and years um i should probably stop stop flirting now because this is

The claim that because your agents are murdering innocent civilians, you need to respond as if it's an insurrection. I I mean d you know the dispiriting thing is and you're an English teacher, uh o uh I mean not literature language, but you The dispiriting thing is that all the dystopian novels describe this. I mean this th the playbook, it's not just the history books. I'm gonna read you something from The Handmaid's Tale, if I may.

Th there were marches, of course, a lot of women and some men, but they were smaller than you might have thought. I guess people were scared. And when it was known that the police or the army who or whoever they were would open fire almost as soon as any of the marches even started,

the marches stopped. A few things were blown up, post offices, subway stations, but you couldn't even be sure who was doing it. It could have been the army to justify the computer searches, and the other ones, the door to doors. That the the door to door searches. That's Margaret Atwood in The Handmaid's Tale, which

She herself has described as a warning, not not not as a novel, but a warning and and you're smack in the middle of it. What what should this question feels a bit inadequate now that I'm talking to you, but Wha what what should media do in a moment like this? What should proper journalists be doing? I don't even know because um I I mean to be honest, like on Saturday when this was happening, I turned on our local news and I just it wasn't cutting it for me. I feel like I feel like he

I mean even the people who are here locally, like the the newsreaders, they don't live in the city. They live out in the suburbs. They don't they they don't know the city. And so nothing quite seems adequate, but I feel like anybody can say anything they want. and present anything the way they want to present it and It's not really true unless you were living it. And I just

You know, wanted to share my perspective of somebody who's living it and get that out. Thank you. No, I I mean I you sound traumatized but uh y you know, and that's just somebody who is involved. Um and I have a lot of privilege, you know. I'm a white woman and I'm a teacher and And to be honest, like I mean I don't go many places right now, um outside of home and work. And the truth is is that I have not actually seen any ICE agents myself. Um

But I know that, you know, they're out there and I mean I've seen them online on, you know, video and on whatever, but not personally. So I consider myself to be at this point very lucky and very privileged.

Bye. That's not the case for most people. No, of course it isn't. And and uh you know, and uh the the point here as well, of course, is that neither Rene Nicole Good nor Alex Pretti were the targets of yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r

Um I well in in Renee Nicole Good's case, it arguably just in the wrong place at the wrong time, but in Alex Petty's case standing up for what he believed in, what he write, the same principles and values that prompted him to take a job in a veteran affairs hospital working in the intensive care unit. 10.47 yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r a button to press or a book to open that tells you what to do.

There there are warnings from the past, there are warnings from the canon, from from from, you know, dystopian literature. But there's no manual. What what do you do when your president your democratically elected president is a fascist and starts killing civilians for the crime of what? Refusing to ignore the evidence of their own eyes and ears. I I don't know what the answers to these questions are, but there are many more important questions around at the moment.

Ten fifty one is the time. I I mean what do we do? What does the United Kingdom do if the United States is a fascist state. Articulate as uh as Jonathan Roch. I until recently I resisted using the F word to describe President Trump. For one thing there were too many elements of classical fascism that didn't seem to fit.

For another, the term has been overused to the point of meaninglessness, especially by left leaning types who call you a fascist if you oppose abortion or affirmative action. I always think of Rick Mail in the young ones at that point, who I think he called a Milkman fascist. Everyone was a fascist who who disagreed with him. Um for yet another, the term is hazily defined even by its adherents.

from the beginning fascism has been an incoherent doctrine. And even today scholars can't agree on its definition. Italy's original version differed from Germany's, which differed from Spain's, which differed from Japan's and this piece in the Atlantic goes on to explain why now is the time to use it. It is obviously fascism.

And that is a crystallizing moment because you're either for it or against it. Or and I think we always underestimate this constituency when we discuss the big events in history, you're too worried about paying the bills. To be even paying that oh dear, someone got shot, that seems very bad. Mo most people if if the bills have been paid and the job needs doing and da da da da da the wheels are turning

tend not to get involved in this stuff. And that's how fascism triumphs, not through civil wars or coup d'etat, but through complacency. In the face of epically corrupt Regimes which are dedicated largely to self enrichment. These are the lessons of history.

And there won't be any climb down here. If if there is any response that looks like justice, it will be a holding tactic designed to put everything on ice, if you pardon the pun. until they start again. Donald Trump I I mean listen, I'm gonna say stuff now that may embarrass me. But he doesn't want the midterms.

Simon Marks, who will join us at eleven forty five today, has explained on several occasions his fears that he will confect insurrection, having incited a real one, he will confect a fake one to justify the suspension of midterm elections. At what point does everybody just accept that this is fascism? Pure and simple. They murdered a nurse. And they called him a terrorist. The problem is the other lesson from history is that it it doesn't really change in the small moment.

It changes in the big moments. You've got to invade Poland. for the world to wake up to what you are. But remember, long before Hitler invaded Poland, Winston Churchill was describing who he was, what he would do and what he stood for. ymwneud â phobl, yn ymwneud â phobl, yn ymwneud â phobl, yn ymwneud â phobl, yn ymwneud â phobl, yn ymwneud â phobl, yn ymwneud â phobl.

like the Daily Mail, senior members of the aristocracy, many, many major establishment figures, supremely comfortable with Nazism. I guess the invasion of Poland, um kind of made it clear that he had imperial ambitions that would not end at his own borders. But that of course didn't put off some of his sympathisers and supporters, even in this country, who kind of wanted Hitler to be in charge.

whether or not they wrote articles for the Daily Mail saying I'd take Hitler, Wartz and all, over um Winston Churchill, the lawyer I don't know. We'll have to wait to see what Dick Littlejohn's latest contributions to public discourse are this week, now that the fascism of his hero has become absolutely undeniable, and another innocent man, a nurse who looked after military veterans,

lies dead on an American street. While they lie about him, while Christy Nome says he arrived at the scene to inflict maximum damage on individuals and to kill law enforcement. The only problem with that analysis is that we can all see what happened. Every single one of us. And of course if if you can't see it for yourself. Someone can describe it to you. It is clear. Absolutely clear. But I don't know what it means. Moon's in Kilburn. Moona, what would you like to say?

Hi James. Um I hope you're doing well this morning. Happy Monday. Um I'm just gonna give just uh give you a brief uh recap of just about me a little bit. I promise it's gonna be less than a minute. I take it. That's all right I I go on forever. I don't know why anyone else feels the need to be brief. Uh no worries. Um so I've actually uh I'm from London originally, but I moved to Minneapolis when I was nineteen. I'm now thirty five.

I've actually attended um high school there for a year, even was part of the Che Logan Track team. Um, I went to university, graduated with my undergrad. I worked through high s uh college, I've been having two jobs, um, and then also starting my career in technology. and finally end up working for a big five hundred five hundred uh five hundred fortune company. Okay. Uh one of the big companies in Minnesota. So I've lived there for a very long time. I also happened

Yeah, well I I'm I've also come back to London every at least once or twice a year. My entire family, my mom, um, my grandma, everybody lives here, my sisters So I come home often. So I take that flight uh back from London to Minneapolis. I've taken it over twenty times. Um, there was a time where there wasn't even a direct flight, uh only about ten years ago. So I um am also an immigrant, um I'm also Somali.

Um this is not something I was planning to admit. Um uh like Alex, I I think had some uh with the law I have a misdemeanor, so technically which I you know, yeah uh did my volunteer work um it's very different. I mean uh happy to go into it if you have questions later. But technically if you was to look at me from Donald's eyes, I'm an immigrant, I'm Ghost Somalian, I'm a criminal. So all of those ki things are true.

But however everything else I said before is also true. Um, this year, um, I've been back to Minneapolis a few times. I've been back and forth from London. I'm uh currently actually unemployed for the first time in nineteen years. So my family just going back and forth from London and uh Minneapolis. And in September I decided not to go back for a friend's wedding.

because if you remember this same thing that's been happening in Minneapolis uh was happening in California for a very long time over the summer. And the same way the media was covering it in America, they're covering the same way that they're uh covered what happened in California with the ice raids and those immigrants that were working on the farms and the people and um calling them riots in LA and all of that. So this story which is kinda crazy, like I don't see a lot of people

kind of it's like we've lived through this. It was just in the summer. So I instead I didn't attend uh my friend's wedding'cause I didn't want to get uh I didn't want anything to happen to me and then having people to you know, choose between the wedding and me or something like that. Because it was a real threat. What are you seeing now? I mean what what what are you what are you seeing now?

I was back in ca uh I went back in October to volunteer for the Mayor's race because again, it's very much my community. I live in Minneapolis for the last nineteen years. I uh had some friends. Okay. Yep I just wanted to say something. Uh I'm planning to go back. But this is the first time in nineteen years I had to feel like I had to email my lawyer.

I am ev uh all my text messages and my friends are saying, Don't come back, don't come home, we're so glad that you're not here. When I'm telling them that they sh when they're going to the protest, stay safe, they're like, Oh, I'm being safe. There there's nothing that being safe means. You can be walking down the street. Alex was helping two people. I've helped people get up and when they slip from the snow. I it's you're it's an in

i and your government it's some like they're just not there to help you. They can barely even secure the client scene and how am I supposed to go somewhere and feel like I could like I could like some I could disappear. People are disappearing. And I don't like I grew up in Minnesota. Like, um, you know, I'm I when people ask me where I'm from, I'm I'm Minnesota or London, I say both. And um

In fact I can't I'm terrified to even go. Um I just don't understand like and it's been I've been terrified for a very long time, but I'm even more terrified now because I'm Somalian. And then going to Minneapolis. Trump is singling out you your y people of your ethnicity for um the for for the next stage really of of racist othering. It's specifi specifying in the way it was Haitians in in in the run up to the election, it's Somalis who've come out

next on Trump's list of people who he will use to to demonize everybody of colour and everybody from an ethnic minority, but it puts you at the front end, it puts you at the sharp end. What do you think and I am already late for the news, so very briefly, what what happens next? I um like I said to all my uh people that contacted me, I'm gonna do what I need to do, which is I'm gonna have to face

whatever happens to me. Um and what happens next is who the people that haven't spoken out um they have a decision to really make within themselves Um yeah, you're right. That is I mean that is it, which means we can't answer it'cause we don't know how many of them there will be. I've already quoted uh Margaret Atwood. Um that that was Tom in Somerset who brought that to my attention. Th th this is uh Ernest Hemingway, I'm pretty sure. There are many who do not know they are fascists.

but we'll find it out when the time comes. And we're in that time now.

Aren't we? Is that a question? I want to talk about the um Labour Party infighting, the Labour Party Civil War. But it feels a little bit ridiculous compared to the descent of the United States into inarguable fascism. Um, hopefully we'll find a way to do both. I also really like the story about class. Um and the arts, but I I can't look away from that. There are many who do not know they are fascists, but will find it out when the time comes.

Yeah, eleven oh five is the time. I and you know, I think we've kind of earned the right To plough our own furrow, haven't we, over the years on this programme? The th that the listening figures don't lie. Um but I I I I fully uh appreciate the fact that most of the UK media today is obsessing about Keir Starmer blocking Andy Burnham's attempt to get back into parliament via a by election. And I would like to talk about that. I I just

I can't be completely honest with you. It would just feel a bit daft to me at the moment. A couple of the calls we took in the last hour, I mean all the calls we took in the last hour were chilling, but a couple were so personal. The United States is our neighbour. I I mean you know, geographically, technically, but culturally and historically by far our closest neighbour. Speaking about the United Kingdom now and and Ireland, I suppose. Otherwise you're gonna get all pedantic on me.

And and they go they they I think they're a fascist state. How could you not want to talk about that? And John Bolton told us. It was Trump's national security advisor who found some courage after he left the administration. This is what he said. He listens to Putin, he listens to Z.

He listens to how they talk about governing unburdened by uncooperative legislatures, unconcerned with what the judiciary may do, and he thinks to himself, Why can't I do that? This doesn't amount to being a fascist in my view. Or having a theory of how you want to govern, it's just why can't I have the same fun they have? But if the fund they have is fascism, then what does that make you?

And if it's not fascism, what we're seeing now, then what is it? And and that's where the uh the Hemingway line kicks in. Which um h happily Jay has has given me the full excerpt. Um and and it's the last line that will chill you. Are there not many fascists in your country? So dialogue. Well, there are many who do not know they are fascists, but will find out, find it out when the times come. When the time comes.

But you cannot destroy them until they rebel? No, Robert Jordan said. We cannot destroy them, but we can educate the people so that they will fear fascism and recognise it as it appears, and combat it.

Well now I think we have to recognise it as it appears. But I don't know how you combat it. That was a question I asked in the last hour. I'm going to leave it on the board. This is fascism. How do you combat it? O three four four four four four five six oh six zero nine seven three. Um and then the the second bit is a bit a bit wooly. What does it mean? If the United States of America is a fascist country, what does that mean?

It's not even what should we do'cause we don't know, but what does it mean? And I'm gonna keep going on about the invasion of Poland. I know it's a little bit odd, but if you think about it it makes perfect sense. Because sometimes it takes these moments these big moments to crystallize what all the little moments meant So when when Hitler invaded Poland, he'd already been embarked upon a campaign of domestic horrors, the likes of which um we probably thought we'd never see again.

It's it's not as if we woke up one morning, invaded Poland and then started persecuting Jewish people, or journalists, or trade unionists, or protesters. The invasion of Poland was the moment that the rest of the world decided that it mattered. We're not going to see that, despite his comments about Greenland.

Ah, all right there. A little tweeting, a little chirping of my hyperbole alarm. That little voice inside your head going, Come on, mate, it's twenty twenty-six, we're talking about America. This isn't nineteen thirties Germany. But then you come back to that line from Hemingway.

We can educate the people so that they will fear fascism and recognise it as it appears and combat it. What if you can't recognise it as it appears? What if you're surrounded by people, as much of the UK media seems to be? Who are telling you to to wind your neck in. You've got Trump derangement syndrome. That's not fascistic at all. That's not the direction of traffic, you silly boy. What are you on about?

Huh. You're overreacting, you're overreacting. Yeah, so what would it be? It'd be like twenty twenty, you're overreacting. Twenty twenty one, you're overreacting. January the sixth, you're overreacting. Pardoning the insurrectionists, you're overreacting. Rene Nicolgood, yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r yw'r. It's not over it. What does it mean?

Um I gotta read you this from Stuart,'cause it is of a piece with where I am this morning, but I won't be there every morning, Stuart. He tells us I couldn't give a monkeys about Burnham or the Beckhams. James is in Camberwell. James, what made you pick up the phone?

Um, yeah, so uh the question around what what what do we do? I think we as as as the UK to combat what is like undoubtedly turning into to a fascist state. The the praise first they came for the trade union, so I did not speak out really does come to mind there. I mean if this was Uh th it is a rogue state in my view now, and if it was another country in the world that wasn't a superpower, they'd be sending an expeditionary force to uh

to introduce democracy, um, which yeah I don't know if we would in the current climate actually,'cause it w you know, you'd need to wait for America to lead the way, wouldn't you? Yeah, precisely. Um I think that the the the the UK and I think it's it's uh actually an opportunity for Starmer to to show some actual d decisive decision making um to

cut ties as much as you can with the United States and move back to and I hate to to bring up the EU referendum here but but to go but to go back to Europe and to work with our partners France, Germany, Spain, Italy and the rest of the European Union. to build a an economic and defensive um cooperation like like we once had. Um Because and they still do remember I know you know this, but it's it's sometimes forgotten in our conversations that they're still they've still got it and uh

And in many ways, Mark Carney showed that you didn't need to be in it to recognise the importance of it, or or at least of what it represents. And it's much harder for Starmer, people keep telling me. And they're right. I mean it is much harder for Starmer because of Um the isolation that has been inflicted upon the country by people he disagreed with politically, by by the economic dependencies.

that we have on the United States of America by the military cooperation, you know? Wha what what happens to Lakinheath? What happens to the to the military installations? What happens to Trident? I mean It's an overused phrase, and I say that as the man who invented it, but it would be like trying to get the eggs out of a baked cake, James.

Yeah, it's not gonna happen overnight, but um you know, w we we have for far too long been reliant on on the US for um especially from a from a military perspective. Um you you see Germany especially that is is rearming and uh Who would have thought that we'd be happy about Germany rearming um uh you know, during a time of crisis. But and and your your original point actually.

about what we do when you know, we decide that other countries need a little bit of Western democracy. We go and bomb them into Western democracy. But your your other point is actually quite haunting because the short answer is nothing. If America is going fascist, what what what can we do for them as opposed to for ourselves, to insulate ourselves from it, or to um

uh, I I don't know, mitigate it. Uh y w we can have that conversation a lot and we can use clever phrases like getting the eggs out of a baked cake and we can talk about Germany rearming. But in terms of Our friends and and colleagues and family in America, if the country is going fascist, what can we do to help?

I think we need to hope that the midterms... If they go ahead. If they go ahead, but honestly... uh nothing's off the table is there. I mean the the third the third term jokingly, Oh, I won't run for a third term, the fact that he's even saying that is is is concerning. Um, I think you just gotta try and it it's hard to hit such a superpower economically, but um I I think we we need to start

pulling out investments and it's probably gonna hit us as well, but I think for the it'll hit back. I mean I d I mean is there a historical precedent here? I mean I I keep talking about Poland, so Dayton land happened before Poland but it wasn't enough. to to to galvanize opposition across across the world. Did d did we start forgive my ignorance and you might not know either, but did we start

Pulling investments out of Germany in in like nineteen in the early nineteen thirties? Did we start did we start divesting of German investments in nineteen thirty five, nineteen thirty six? I don't know. We went to the Olympics in thirty six, so we didn't be the only uh one I can think of. apartheid South Africa where you boycotted. We went to the Olympics in Berlin in 1936, so it's highly unlikely that we'd started boycotting German goods or anything like that, albeit that...

The trade flows then weren't w uh what they are now. Uh that that's a scary thought. Thank you, James. You know, i w we watch it in America Cousins, uh whatever it is. Uh uh what can we do to help? I mean, you you gave us most of the dystopia. We gave the world nineteen eighty four, I use we very loosely, um and and um a couple of other classics of the genre, but you're looking at a handmaid's tale

Ah, you're looking at the hunger games for younger listeners and and and you're looking at America and you can't really see the difference between the three situations described. And and you sort of read them as a Brit thinking, well, you know, we'd help our mates, wouldn't we? What could we do? Answer nothing. So what does it mean? What does it mean?

If and I use that word very, very lightly, loosely, I'm not sure it's necessary, should probably be now that. But what does it mean if America is fascist?

Quarter past eleven is the time. Seventeen minutes after eleven. I I just returned to that piece in The Atlantic um by Jonathan Roach who who essentially writes under the headline, Yes, it's fascism and and he writes to someone who resisted using that word until very, very recently. Writing a year ago, I argued that Trump's governing regime is a version of patrimonialism, in which the state is treated as the personal property and family business of the leader.

That is still true, but I also noted then patrimonialism is a style of governing, not a formal ideology or system. It can be layered atop all kinds of organizational structures, including not just national governments, but also urban political machines such as Tammany Hall, criminal gang such as Tammany Hall, criminal gangs such as the mafia, and even religious um cults.

Because its only firm principle is personal loyalty to the boss, it has no specific agenda. Fascism, in contrast, is ideological, aggressive, and at least in its early stages revolutionary. It seeks to dominate politics, to crush resistance and to rewrite the social contract. And if you don't think that's happening now in the United States of America, then I've got a bridge I'd like to sell you.

Speaking of the United States of America, um Margaret Atwood of course is Canadian. You can hear a rather splendid interview I did with her for the full disclosure series, wherever you get your podcast, which should of course be from the Global Player or the LBC app.

Um that was one of the ones I did during lockdown. Have I ever told you about how weird those moments were? So I'd be sitting in my house. It was weird enough doing the radio show from a shed, with no colleagues at all. I couldn't even see Keith's smiling face. So it wasn't all bad. Uh but doing when I was doing full disclosure, which I'd do on Zoom, on my computer screen, I'd be sitting in in in our back bedroom.

엔치즈 Or Margaret Out, we're talking to some of the most seminal cultural figures of our age. And I could hear my kids downstairs watching Peppa Pig. Actually they're probably a bit old for Peppa Pig, but what uh you know, watching I don't know what it was they were watching. The probably the Hunger Games.

It's just surreal that stuff. And and I I don't know, they're worth revisiting those interviews, but they are very, um what's the word that I want? Very much oh I think i i d I think if you didn't know about lockdown there are elements of it that feel a little bit weird. 90 minutes after 11. I've got an idiot's corner for you. Thank you, Steve. I'll read that out in a moment. Sensational. Uh the United States of America is uh I I I I mean

increasingly difficult not to describe as fascist. What on earth does that mean? Not just to us in the UK, but to you as an American. Uh to you. What does it mean to you?

Because I I I don't think I'd realised until today that in the context of answering the question of what do we do to help The answer is nothing. There's nothing we can do. Greenland was a moment, wasn't it? But you know about us but without us is how the Czechoslovakian people describe the seeding of Sudetenland to Adolf Hitler.

It's all there. In fact, Natasha uh Devon, who wasn't with you this weekend, precisely because she's been away, was in Prague and it was in a museum there that she um saw a little graphic describing what the Munich Agreement signed on september twenty ninth, nineteen thirty eight, was. When Hitler acquired Czechoslovakia's borderland fortifications and a large part of its economic base, all without a fight, because we weren't up for it.

That's why the Greenland moment for historians of the future, which was the angle I chose to take on that story last week. How are historians of the future going to deal with this? It could it could be there. It could be in all the books. Mark Carney, Keir Starmer, Emmanuel Macron and and others stood up and said, No, you can't have it. They didn't do that in in nineteen thirty eight, and you know what happened next? The Munich betrayal, Czechs still call it. Um

But it wasn't enough. And the killing of one nurse on the streets of Minneapolis won't be enough either. The world can't really do anything to stop the direction of traffic in America, so what on earth can Americans do?

I don't know the answer to any of these questions, but I know I should shut up for a while and listen to you instead. Toby's in Bristol. Toby, what made you pick up the phone? Good morning. I think it was your earlier comments about the equivalence to what was happening in Germany. Uh I've spoken to you before

I remember Tony. My father was kind of transport. I remember. And my grandfather was sent to Theresenstadt in Czechoslovakia where he was murdered. Wow. And I I do see the direct parallels between what we're seeing now Um, if you want the the as you say, the the Greenland issue is a bit like Sudetenland, but also Venezuela is sort of maybe a more modern version. mewn gwirionedd yn ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r ymwneud â'r sfeir.

The problem we've got is because we've excluded ourselves from the the uh collegiate nature of the EU, we are isolated and weak. And I think at some point and I and I uh I've I've said this to quite a message Kirsty directly. He's got a lot on his mind this week he's got a lot on his mind this weekend. He does. But I'm I it's trying to get him to understand how the how or to to see that the the the plates of the world have changed and that our place is back within the EU.

I know that's desperately naïve. But uh my parents both served in in the army in the Second World War and my father who obviously came here as a refugee state removed Jewish refugee force in the British Army. in uh in Burma and then in India for separate partitioning. And what they then brought back and what I grew up with was a s a a deep understanding of how Europe had to come together and the passion which they spoke and believed in about the EU project which which they all understood.

help protect us. I think and I do think that that is what is lacking in our understanding of where we have to go because as your previous caller said, there is nothing we can do. We can stand by. and watch them descending into and it is fascism. There is no doubt this is what is happening if you I'm I'm I'm inviting doubt, just just just for the avoidance of doubt. If anybody wants to have a crack at explaining why it isn't.

Um or why we shouldn't be using that word. Even if you want to insert a yet into your analysis, then the number is the same one that Toby used, O three four five six zero six oh nine seven three. But the problem, Toby, is That you know, g let's grant everything you say as being true. I don't think I'd argue with any of it, but some people would, might. And we have a a a a a homogenous, reunited Europe.

can't do anything about what's going on in the United States. We just have to sit until it's played out. I mean what you're describing is protecting our own interests in the context of America being lost to Democracy and decency. There's nothing nothing we can do. I don't know why why. Is it'cause I sort of grew up when the map was all red and I've still got

You know, we've o all got images of Winston Churchill in our personal mental furniture and we can't quite accept that the United Kingdom is largely irrelevant on the world stage now. But as as a not even as a member of the European Union, we just sit here and say, Oh, bad luck, America See you on the other side.

But I think that I think you're right. I'm an I'm a good few years older than you unfortunately. And uh and and my un my understanding of Europe, I mean I I have followed the European project since about you know, since we joined in nineteen ninety two. I'm one of these odd people who actually

found bothered to find out about it and understood why we benefited. And I think that as you say, as America disappears into this you know, blazer fascism, that at least we have the structures and the coordination uh and the economic access that being in the EU provides. And there's there's uh many conversations that you've had and I've listened to and we've spoken about is the is the staggering damage that Brexit did to us economically.

and that we are therefore tied more strongly to the American economy and therefore we are hamstrung. phrase cow out, I know it's not acceptable anymore, but two here. We've seen what's we've seen what has happened. They are excluded and they are threatened. And so we are staggeringly weak on that front. And the only way is back in, because ultimately... they will do what they want to do. And even when Trump is gone gone, the damage has been done. It it's it's it's seeding

disruption and damage for decades to come because all these people that support him are all at the top of the heap now and even when he goes they will still be there. This is not a s this is not a sudden occurrence or a ten year occurrence. This is a sort of a conservative right nationalistic project that's been going on since probably before Reagan.

Yeah. So I I mean, you know, this is just a little radio phoning show on on on one radio station in one European country, but the idea That there's anything except detachment. That constitutes a proper response to the direction of traffic in America is pie in the sky, isn't it? Divestment and detachment is all you can do. And that sends a horrible message to our American

Families. They're selling off uh their their debts, American debt. And we are second by it so you can correct me if I'm wrong on that. owners of American Death at some point they're gonna have to China after China. And at some point I think maybe that is the only option we're going to have. And where do we turn? We have to turn to the place that's next door to us.

Yeah. For all its problems it's still it's it's as use as you quite often say don't let the you know the imperfect be the enemy of the good. Rydyn ni'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd.

And this is the opportunity it can take to get us through and to explain it. And then this is again comes back down to education and th and how how this has been undermined over the last, you know, few decades, to allow us to get to the point where Mae'r pethau'r pethau'r pethau'r pethau'r pethau'r pethau'r pethau'r pethau'r pethau'r But just opinion. And and that was there from the start. And and you know, I I I I don't know why more people didn't recognise the peril.

Donald Trump describing news as fake news. All of those invitations to ignore the evidence of your eyes and ears were were embryonic then and now they're fully fledged and and yet still some people cling to the idea that there is

Something unhorrifying going on. Which brings us to Idiot's Corner and a late opening for today. This is from Steve. Have you completely lost the plot, O'Brien? Six days straight talking about Trump and American politics. Anyone would think you were trying to divert attention away from the hapless starmer and the growing support for the Reform Party.

Um well it's odd that, Steve, because your um history of text shows quite a lot of interest in Donald Trump, uh up to and including a selection of yawning emojis when we were talking about how he insulted every um uh member of the British military that died in Afghanistan last week. So let's play a game then. Let's uh so which British politician described Donald Trump's hideous denigration of the British war dead as not quite fair.

Was it A, the hapless Keir Starmer Steve? Was it B the leader of the Green Party Zach Polansky? Or was it C, your hero Nigel Farage? Which which mealy mouthed Muppet elected to describe that hideous, hideous intervention from Donald Trump as not quite fair? Was it A? Kirstama, was it B Zak Polanski or was it C the great patriot, the great upholder of British values, Nigel Farad?

Well done, Steve. And do you know what? While we're at it, which British politician had their bills paid at the Davos Economic Summit last week by an Iranian billionaire?

Which British politician had all of their bills picked up by an Iranian billionaire who described him as somebody uh who had been advising them since two thousand and eighteen. So which British politician went to Davos and had their hotel picked up and their passes and um access provided by an Iranian billionaire whose company said that he, the mysterious British politician Steve, that we're worried about talking about, had been an advisor to this Iranian billionaire for the past eight years.

I'll give you a clue, Steve. His initials are NF. It's half past 11 and you're listening to Dominic Ellis. Well, you're listening to James O'Brien, but Dominic Ellis has your headline. It is 1134. You're listening to James O'Brien on LBC. And uh of course the answer to all of those questions. That I posed before the news was Nigel Farage. He is the UK politician who attended Davos, a gathering which he has previously been very, very rude about.

On a pass sponsored by the family office of an Iranian billionaire. Um I'd be fascinated to find out why, but don't hold your breath. Um because we still haven't found out why he's decided no longer to boycott the BBC or to the currently solitary member of Idiot's Corner this week, Steve.

Um, why he elected to describe Donald Trump's hideous insult to the families, uh, never mind the dead themselves of every British soldier who died in Afghanistan during a twenty year deployment um undertaken at the behest of the Commander in Chief of the United States, and Farage last weekend dec this weekend decided to describe it as not quite fair.

I suppose at the very least you'd have to describe as something of an understatement. Uh but thanks for the reminder. We we we must put these things in front of people like you, Steve, because you certainly won't be hearing about them on GBBs. Where I suspect you prefer to be tuned. Eleven thirty five is the time. Fascism on the ground. In America fascism, on on the march, in America fascism now

I think almost uh inarguably in place in the United States of America. And if I've discovered anything this morning it's that there's not a great deal that you and I can do about it.

I don't know that we've got a big enough following in the States and and also with time differences and what have you, to do what we did sometimes in the aftermath of Brexit, which was dedicate the entire t programme on uh on leading Britain's conversation to people who weren't in Britain. But I I I mean there'll be plenty of Americans listening. Um I I d I d I mean what does it mean in the great scheme of things?

Do we are we such a a I mean uh is post Brexit Britain such a diluted and denuded power that we will actually have less ability to distance ourselves from fascism than Canada, which has a border with the fascist state, or the European Union, which contains very fascist sympathetic leaders. Are we so diluted and denuded as a world power now that that that we will be left with little choice?

But to just sort of hold our noses and go along with everything. I do not know. I don't know anything today. Um that's the nature of conversations about unprecedented things happening. Happily I've got a switchboard, although you could be forgiven for not knowing given the amount of words that have come out of my mouth so far this morning. Zach Sin Slau. There's three more. Zach, what would you like to say? Hello James. Hello. Um I think yes, America is fascist but they don't know it.

Yeah. Um yeah, I have a friend in America and we speak quite regularly. And I I think it he thinks that America is the saviour and the fas fascism is their is their path to saving For example, Iran. They they wanna they wanted to invade in Iran and his outlook on it was we're going there to liberate the Iranian people because protesters are being killed. Oddly, when I pointed out that protesters are being killed in the United States of America

He quite straight away, without thinking about it, he said, Oh no, but they were resisting arrest and they had firearms and they were they are the terrorists. What does he think they were doing in Iran? Um well Basically whatever America does is right. Whatever Trump does is gospel. And nothing will break that spell. Well, I find it very difficult to get through to him and I think the reason is because the media in America

has brainwashed him and b brainwashed the masses into thinking that they're doing the right thing, Trump is doing the right thing. Well not the ma I mean enough to probably qualify that phrase, the masses, but but his approvement approval levels of plummeting and uh opposition to this latest debacle this latest aberration extends even into um the Republican Party and into into Republican governors. But we sit here naively thinking that when fascism rises, everybody

Rydyn ni'n meddwl ei fod yn ymwneud â'r amlwg yn ymwneud â'r amlwg, yn ymwneud â'r amlwg, a'r amlwg. Rydyn ni'n ymwneud â'r amlwg. Rydyn ni'n ymwneud â'r amlwg. Rydyn ni'n ymwneud â'r amlwg, a'r amlwg. will furiously resist. They will all be Alex Pretti. But of course they won't. Huge, huge, huge numbers of people will not just be ambivalent about it or comfortable with it, they will be actively enthusiastic for it. And and that I think is the surprise, isn't it?

Yeah, yes, the funny thing is he he lived in uh the UK for many years and that's how we became friends and then he moved uh to he's actually originally American. But he lived here for like twenty years and that's how we're friends. And he was a very loving, caring uh I would almost class him as a hippie type of person.

And then he moved to the United States of America and since Trump has come in, he's totally changed. It's like I'm talking to a different person. How amazing. Do we know I mean part of it would be does he watch Fox News? Oh, y he loves all of those American sponsored channels, uh Trump sponsored channels and stuff. I don't think he has any other alternative news because sometimes I say things to him which he just didn't even know about.

And that's the point, isn't it? So it looks like our friend Steve there, who's also pretty close to a fascist, thinking that uh or or not being aware that his hero was in Davos on an Iranian billionaires ticket or that his hero was essentially letting Donald Trump off the hook for insulting the British war dead. And in fact I think it's the same party. There's a councillor out there on social media at the moment who's been championing ICE

after they murdered Alex Preti in Minneapolis. No prizes for guessing whose party that councillor belongs to. It's Steve's favourite. Politician Nigel Farage again. I well I mean I I g so questions that I might ask you include why are you still friends? And I I think I know the answer, but I'd like to hear you say it. Well actually I've already said to him that I don't think we can be friends anymore because of the some of the things he's been sending over.

I'm actually keeping in contact with him because he's a great w window into the other side for me. And you're now a window into the window for us. So so you know, hang in there. So I I remember Michael ringing in last week to talk about ymwneud â llawer o llawer o llawer o llawer o llawer o llawer o llawer o llawer o llawer o llawer

sympathizers with the racism as opposed to sympathizers with Michael, possibly Steve actually, the texter earlier. I should check the history. We're very cross. So it's disgusting that someone would cut their parents out of their life in order to um uh object to their fascism or their profound racism. But that that's the point actually, isn't it? Is that i i that's what also normalises it. You're right to stay in touch. It's helpful to have a window on it.

But unless unless we shut the door in these people's faces, they won't realise how disgusting their behaviour is. Yeah. But I'm I'm trying to it's like the old saying, um, keep your friends close and your enemies closer. I mean he's not he's not my enemy but his beliefs are totally opposite opposite to what I believe. So I I w I thought this is more educational for me. Um sometimes he sends stuff that is so At odds to what I believe.

that I can't believe that i there are people sending this propaganda stuff. But there is, obviously it's his algorithms. He s he he would actively search um things that are denigrating towards like the UK. He thinks the UK is overrun by Muslims and even though he lived here.

Yes, but now that he's spending his life on TikTok or or or or Elon Musk's social media platform, he's absolutely convinced. It's ri th there's a phone in here. We'd probably do it tomorrow actually. So how do you deal'cause it's a bit like during the pandemic when we were talking about the the vaccine deniers, the people who who denied science. And and it's similar, isn't it? Is that y you know, you could be married to one, Zach. You should count your blessings.

Oh, you should see the stuff he sends over for vaccine uh anti vaccine. It goes hand in hand, does it? Yes, I'm not sure. That's interesting. I think Farage said something a bit weird about vaccines the other day. So he he need thank I've very grateful to Steve for reminding me to to to bring all this to your attention because F Farage has also been

flirting with the anti vaccine bandwagon. And of course he invited someone onto the stage at the Reform UK Party conference who claimed that King Charles had contracted cancer as a consequence of the vaccine. So we have got our own little sort of cheap um, pound land version of of Trump over here. But at at the moment uh uh the the use of the F word would probably still be inappropriate because you need to have power

to enact it. Can I I don't know if this is an inappropriate question, can I just inquire after your kind of background and ethnicity, if that's all right.

Uh yes, I'm British Asian. My parents were from Pakistan. I'm Muslim. And does your friend realise that you'd be pulled over if you were in Minneapolis at the moment? Well uh interestingly I was going to go to the States to watch the World Cup. Yeah. But I'm not going to anymore and I told him the reason why I can't do it is because

I don't think I'd fit in anymore in the in the United States. And I probably would get rejected uh my visa wouldn't might even get rejected, so I'm not even gonna bother applying. I think that's be interesting to watch the numbers on that and I don't know Mae llawer o bobl yn y UK yn 1936 yn ddweud y byddai'r syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau syniadau

And I don't know. I I f I apologise for not having a history. I've told you before my A level was all about Byzantium, um and Charlemagne, which is not a great deal of use in the current context, but I presume that the parallels are pretty powerful. Um

I I I I I just hope Gary Lineker doesn't say anything about them because then the Daily Mail will have an embolism. It's quarter to twelve. We've got Simon Marks up next and uh it's always, of course, a pleasure to hear from Simon, but I think you'd agree with me. Some days Um it's actually a duty here. It is eleven forty seven and you are listening to James O'Brien on LBC where

Um I I should have mentioned earlier actually. I've been quoting from the rather excellent piece in The Atlantic by uh Jonathan Rauch but Simon Marks has a a characteristically acute piece in the I newspaper today as well, where he once again resists the urge to indulge in any I told you so's but it is fair to say that an awful lot of what you have sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n

Alex Pretti and and you may disagree with this, actually, but to me it feels different even from Rene Nicole Good, and I don't fully understand why, do you?

Well I think it does feel a little bit different from Rene Nicole Good, which is not in any way James to disparage Rene Nicole Good because I think it's It's absolutely evident that she was shot in cold blood by a trigger happy uh ice agent and that she was at the time of her killing posing no particular threat to that ice agent. But in the case of Alex Pretti, uh I mean the distinction is that he was absolutely exercising his entirely legal right.

To observe and film the enforcement operations that were being conducted by the Border Patrol. At no point. does in any of the videos. At no point do you see him uh goading or engaging with those Border Patrol agents. In fact, what they do is approach him and another woman on the street. They knock the other woman to the ground, and mister Pretti, who at this point only has one thing i in his hand, and that's a cell phone, uh puts his other hand up

To indicate that he's going to go and render some assistance to this woman who's been thrown to the ground. He is, after all, an intensive care unit nurse. As he is trying to render assistance to her, the Border Patrol descend upon him and the woman. Uh, they uh pepper spray both of them, and then they begin pummeling Mr. Pretti. And you know, there is no indication whatsoever that he posed any kind of threat.

to them at all, no indication that any of the mendacious claims made by the Secretary of Homeland Security Christy Noam, the White House Deputy uh Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, you know, that he was a would be assassin that he's arrived at the scene to try and kill as many uh immigration enforcement uh agents as possible. There is no indication to support any of those claims. He wasn't, as they claim, brandishing his weapon. In fact, the ICE agents take his weapon off him.

before they then fire ten bullets into uh the the border patrol agents, I should say. They take his weapon off him before they fire ten bullets into him. And of course the other massive difference here is that Alex Pretti was exercising his Second Amendment rights under the American Constitution legally to carry that pistol. Now we can all discuss why on earth anybody would show up at a protest carrying a loaded gun and from the distance of of London or other European capitals.

That obviously looks like very bizarre behavior. But in the context of Minnesota and in the context of America, where you have the Trump administration going to the map. to defend the Second Amendment rights of Americans to bear arms. Well Mr. Pretti was engaged in his Second Amendment right to bear arms. He was legally permitted.

to carry that gun. He had done everything right in terms of gun ownership, and that of course is one of the reasons why the National Rifle Association posted on social media yesterday saying responsible public voices should be awaiting a full investigation, not making generalizations, and demonizing law abiding citizens, by which they mean mister Pretti. He was at the moment of his killing, as far as all of the video suggests, absolutely a law abiding citizen. You talk about the uh the old

Two countries divided by a foreign language by by um a common language thing. Whi which is never true of them with regard to guns. I I'm always a little bit wary when this happens. You've just spoken and while you were speaking I was thinking and my thoughts have led me to a place and I'm gonna say it out loud and you're going to tell me that I'm wrong. If Alex Pretti hadn't been carrying a gun.

the reaction of the administration would not be currently looking a little bit like an investigation or a climb down. Absolutely. Without question. Uh you are absolutely right. And it's one of the reasons, of course, why the killing of Rene Nicole Good. uh did not achieve uh result in any kind of climb down. I mean if she'd been legally carrying a weapon in her car. I know you live there. Yes it's completely insane. But this is absolutely insane.

But but James, to put it into context, I was just looking up the numbers to remind myself. Do you know how many Americans in 2024? took tried to take guns through security checkpoints at an American airport. The TSA in 2024 intercepted 6,678 firearms at airport security checkpoints and 94% of them were loaded. So when Homeland Security Secretary uh Christy Nohm uh starts talking about why w why would anybody show up at a protest?

With a gun rather than a sign. Well, I don't know, Ms. Gnome, but why does anybody show up at a an American airport? with a loaded gun when they know they're not gonna get it through the security checkpoint. Why is anybody why is the the right of Americans to show up at schools with guns, to show up in uh movie theaters with guns, to show up at uh football games with guns.

Why is that okay? But showing up at a protest with a gun somehow triggers the notion that this man is a would-be assassin. And so what they've really found themselves in difficulty over.

with Alex Pretti and Donald Trump's sort of partial rope no no well well now of course th the the issue is going to be compounded because President Trump's sort of partial climb down last night and he appeared in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, not coincidental, a Murdoch newspaper that yesterday accused the US government of lying about what had taken place in Minneapolis. the fact that he he last night appeared to be committing to some sort of an investigation

uh suggests that he knows how much difficulty he's in. And you've got to if you read that interview, it's very brief, it's a five minute phone conversation he had with the Wall Street Journal. You've got to wonder if he's preparing uh to um you know drop some of these officials uh y who have uh gone way out.

on a limb in calling Mr. Pretti a would be assassin. Is he about to pull the rug out from under them? He may have to. I I mean we're in completely uncharted waters in the context of Western democracies. sort of zoning in on that observation that that you're highlighting and articulating perfectly. From the perspective of pandering to or managing the base, the problem here is not that Alex Pretti was shot. Dead in cold blood, it's the fact that he was carrying

a weapon shortly before he was shot dead in broad daylight in cold blood. I I get it. I just wanted to get that out there because I I can't still quite believe these words are

Emerging. Um and I I I mean I d I I want to talk to you briefly about another story that's been completely swamped by recent events and and and probably rightly so, but it's a story that you brought to our attention some time ago. But but before we do that, what

I mean what happens now? The people on the streets of Minneapolis aren't going to be going anywhere in a hurry. Tim Waltz has been very impressive in his reject Well, here's a question for you. Why when Christine No moots the possibility of removing agents from the streets of Minneapolis. Is she asking for election records and a the electoral register in return?

Absolutely extraordinary. And the answer of course is that the federal government is demanding the Trump administration that every single American state hands its electoral registers over to the White House because the White House says it wants to examine those electoral registers and make sure that everybody on them is properly on those electoral rolls. Now

This is from a Republican Party that allegedly believes in states' rights, and remember, we don't have one election in the United States. We have fifty of them. They're all organized by each individual state. Many Republican states have dutifully handed those electoral registers over. The Democrats, of course, are fighting the request in court.

But the reason why they want to get their hands on it, many critics of the administration contend, is because uh once you've got the electoral register, you've got the power. You've got the power to disrupt elections. to challenge the outcome of elections by saying, well, uh, you know, Mr. Gonzalez from Acacia Avenue uh in uh Houston, Texas. I mean we need to see proof that he

uh is an American citizen and he has a right to vote. So this is all part of preparations for massive jiggery pokery in November. Great use of the phrase jiggery pokery and thank you for making me smile during such dark times. Um you were the first, I think, certainly on this programme to moot the possibility of there being no midterms. What what are the odds on that now in your view?

Mm. Well, I you know, whether the midterms take place or not, I think is is almost not the central question. I think the question is will midterm elections take place in a time honored, free and fair fashion? And that I think is much more unlikely now uh than uh the likelihood of the prospect of the midterms themselves being cancelled. I think that jiggery pokery

Y you know, they are lining it up. They are already beginning it. We've seen the gerrymandering, the redistricting that's taking place in so many states in a bid to try and game the outcome of it. But you certainly can't rule out anything happening depending on the state of the street. in this country by the time we get to uh you know, September, October.

Um w and you will be steering us through that no doubt as well. Um let to take us back to something else that you uh explained to us at the time and that is the removal essentially from from the street of the United States. I refer to Rumezer Osturk, the the the student who

um uh seem to have been taken into custody by ICE officials for doing little more than writing an op ed in in support of the Palestinian cause in the Middle East. This has this this story has developed a bit after the unsealing of documents, I think. Yes, a and to be clear, she was seized off the streets for writing an opinion piece that was critical uh of Israel and that was calling on uh her university tough.

To engage in divestment from Israel. And you know, it was very clear at the time that for the Trump administration. Criticism of Israel, any outward support, not just of course for Hamas, but outward support for the Palestinian cause. uh was generally placing students in jeopardy. Now we know, thanks to uh the release of uh some of these court documents through partly the reporting as well of uh Mother Jones magazine, that the government was engaged in a coordinated effort

to scour uh uh one particular website, but others as well, that were gathering information that was sort of crowdsourced from people who were contributing information and saying You need to look at this article that this woman's written for the student newspaper at Tufts. You need to look at the words that this protester used uh at a particular university. I I mean this is how the government was uh focused.

on particular students and others that it decided to pursue. In what it maintains was a campaign to protect free speech in the United States, but absolutely crack down on what they claimed falsely were terrorist sympathizers. uh in many cases on the campuses of American universities. And as I think you and I said at the time, you know, much of this started on social media. I i some of these students found themselves being arrested, having their visas revoked.

simply because a crowd funded effort to at Secretary of State Marco Rubio or at Homeland Security Secretary Christy Noam on X and other social media platforms grew drew the government's attention uh when's th the numbers of people doing that were sufficient. Uh but now we know it was an even more organised effort using some of these. uh uh more obscure web site sites that themselves were serving as clearing houses

uh essentially for people who wanted to bring information to the government's attention. And indeed C uh anybody criticising Israel arrested and and um uh essentially abducted, I think is probably a reasonable word to use in this context. All Mae'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n rwy'n

In the meantime, thanks for getting up early. Uh one minute after twelve is the time. Um you know, speaking of online propaganda, I've got an extraordinary story for you in the next hour. Which involves a TikTok account that was dedicated to persuading people that that new properties in this country

uh in London in particular, were being handed over to asylum seekers and and refugees and immigrants with no um opportunity for anybody else to live there. Like an extraordinary account dedicated entirely to doing that. And um a a a journalist who doesn't work for the Daily Mail has gone to the trouble of looking into this and trying to work out what was actually going on because it was so obviously untrue.

Of course that doesn't stop millions of people on social media believing it and and Nigel Farage's candidate for London mayor is a big, big believer in all of the online lies about the city that she seeks to be mayor of. um lady haw haw or lady ha ha i think we should call her moving forward but the um But the reality of this story, e even a grizzled old git like me was slightly taken aback by how utterly, utterly nuts it is. We'll find out more about that in the course of the next hour.

Um, but we will probably be turning our attention in the main to domestic politics. And by that I mean Andy Burnham and Keir Starmer, not what should British politicians be doing about um Donald Trump and America's descent breakneck. descent into fascism. I've got you know, I it's quite it's t it's draining, doing the big stuff. I I don't know why and and we won't do a phone in about it today, but I don't know why Alex Pretti's murder

I I don't live in Minneapolis, I don't live in the United States of America. I'm unlikely ever to go there in the foreseeable future. Um so I don't know why why some events, um uh uh anywhere in the world. Th the the case of the I Iranian um a y young woman murdered for wearing her her uh um head scarf wrong. So sometimes they just hit you so hard, don't they? They just they just hit you so much harder than um

Other c horrible things happen everywhere every day. But some some things break through your armour of psychological self protection and a and some things don't. So I don't know why. But um But when I hit the twelve o'clock hour after two hours of of quite heavy lifting, I'm tempted always to to take the path of least resistance. And do you know the question that popped into my mind just then during the news bulletin? I I I mean it might be a bit childish.

But this is where my brain is. All right. So I if I'm inauthentic with you, you can tell. You might not be able to say, Gosh, James is being a bit inauthentic today. But some days when the news agenda doesn't lend itself to our pontifications and ponderings, I have to talk about things I'm not that interested in. This is not one of those days. But when it is one of those days, you can tell. You can actually tell. However hard I try, however loud I shout.

Um, however uh lyrical I wax, you can tell. Uh an inauthentic If I can fake that, I'll be finished in this, but I'll be complete. I'll be the I'll be the finished article if I can learn how to fake that and pretend that I care about things that I don't really care about. I care about this'cause I care about my country.

uh who leads my country is a matter of of of profound importance. I d I don't want to see the United Kingdom go in the way of the United States, which is what would happen I I think in the event of Nigel Farage becoming Prime Minister and and p p potentially perhaps. given some of her comments in these spaces, if if Kemi Baider not were to become Prime Minister. So I I find myself caring about Keir Starmer's position and performance.

Um but I don't have a very clever question for you this hour, right? I h here's what happened at the weekend, if you weren't aware of it. Uh Andy Burnham announced his desire to give up his dream job as mayor of Manchester, into which he was voted merely two years ago, and become or seek instead to become a Member of Parliament again, a Labour MP once more. And prob almost certainly, I don't know if anyone's going to argue with this.

As a precursor to launching some sort of leadership bid against Keir Starmer. I d I mean'cause otherwise, why did he run for mayor of Manchester two years ago? If he'd rather be an MP, why did he run for mayor of Manchester two years ago? So these these are the facts.

He announced his intention to seek to become an MP, which would involve giving up the mayoralty. And it's very hard to frame any account of why he would do that that doesn't include the possibility, the desire, the likelihood, the probability. some sort of leadership challenge to Keir Starmer, whose position both in the country and in the party, the parliamentary Labour Party as well as the broader coalition of the National Labour Party is currently um Fragile to say the least.

And then the National Executive Committee and I told you on Friday that this was going to happen, but newspapers have to fill pages. The National Executive Committee voted eight to one. against allowing Andy Burnham to become a candidate. The official argument is that allowing him to stand down as mayor

Um would have prompted a another election which might have seen reform get in as as mayor of Manchester. They also said it would have risked a return to the psychodrama that dominated the end of the Conservative Party's fourteen years in power.

This is a direct reference to the possibility of a leadership challenge. I think one BBC very prominent Sunday morning BBC presenter elected to describe Labour's local difficulties as a car crash, which to the best of my knowledge is not a phrase that she ever used to describe. the revolving door of leadership and leadership challenges and the rest of it that the Conservative Party was subject to not that long ago. So anyway, here's Keir Starmer talking about it a little bit earlier today.

Andy Burnham's doing a great job. as the mayor of Manchester. But having an election for the Mayor of Manchester when it's not necessary byddwn ni'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd

ymwneud â'n ei wneud i'n ei wneud â'n ei wneud â'n ei wneud â'n ei wneud â'n ei wneud â'n ei wneud â'n ei wneud â'n ei wneud â'n ei wneud â'n ei wneud â'n ei wneud We introduced a rule which said that if you already hold a post ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud.

I mean, come on, man. There's no earthly way that this decision not to let him run for a for a by election, not to let him run for a parliamentary seat, is not motivated by um th th the ultimate plan to become

uh the first of the leadership challengers. But here here's here's what I've got for you. There's two things. I mean we can do the how do you think it's been handled. Keir Starmer has a choice here between a rock and a hard place. Okay. rejecting the application, telling Andy Burnham to sling his hook. The hard place is accepting the application and watching either Andy Burnham lose a by election in Manchester, which would be disastrous. And remember you've got the Greens on the march now.

as well across the country and and opinion polls are never more accurately reflected in actual ballots than they are in midterm by elections. Or Andy Burnham wins, I tell I I got that wrong, didn't I? It's a rock, a hard place and a cliff. face. He's caught between a rock, a hard place, and a cliff face. So the rock is that he decides to tell Andy Burnham he can't have a cracker at this constituency and he'll deal with all the flack caused by that.

um and the perce perception and accusations of weakness. The second is that they have a by election and they lose it, and Starmer's toast because his authority begins and that could still happen, of course. Um I I i i y d the No it couldn't. That's the one thing that's been taken off the table. And and then the third one is that he lets Andy Burnham run, he becomes an MP. They could still lose the by election in that context.

So you've got the cliff face and the rock. Should I change my analogy here? Do you think that the three different ways of saying rock is is unhelpful? So they could so if he'd become if he'd been allowed to run he could have lost. And then they'll have a mayoral election in Manchester as well. So that's the fourth dimension. That's the brick wall. So Keir Starmer is caught between a rock, a hard place, a cliff face, and a brick wall. And he's chosen the rock.

Because if he chose the cliff face he could have hit the brick wall as well. And if he chose the brick wall he could have fallen off the cliff and if he did you see what I mean? It's it's fairly complicated. So it's a four way. It's a bit like that, um No, it's nothing like that. rubbish tip in Star Wars where the walls start closing in. So so it's a four option challenge of which the first option and and you know, I think It has to have been the right thing to do, doesn't it?

Even if it makes him look weak. This is the phone in, O three four five six oh six oh nine seven three. It's it's it's the perfect distillation of that phrase we use a lot, and indeed Toby in Bristol. reminded us of how often we use it, of letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. So once Andy Burnham announced that he wanted to run for this constituency in Manchester, uh Gorton and Denton Once he announced that, Kirstarmer was going to have a bad day. There is no

Scenario in which Kirstarmer emerges from this better than he went into it. It's a nightmare for him. It's a disaster. has got designs upon the leadership, albeit and no one really seems to have mentioned the fact that his last tilt at the leadership was an absolute embarrassment for everybody concerned. But hey ho

No point having a mind if you never change it. So it from the minute he announced his intention to apply to stand in Gorton and Denton, Keir Starmer had a loss. He had a a net negative, he had a minus, he had a problem, right?

Given the options he had I put it to you that he did the only thing he did the only vaguely sensible thing that he could do. So, you know, cue the cue the front pages Crash em, burn em, blocky Andy ignites a Labour civil war. Um Labour faces and that's in the Sun, The Guardian. It's very rare that The Guardian and the Sun have almost identical front pages when it comes to a domestic political story. Labour faces risk of party civil war after PM blocks Burnham's return.

Labour war as Starmer blocks Burnham bid to BMP. You may have got the impression that there's a bit of a war on. In the Labour Party. Um it's always interesting at times like this to see what the Daily Mirror has done, but I don't seem to have brought it into the studio with me today. And the Daily Mail goes for Lame Duck Starmer has only hastened his demise, while the Daily Mirror, strong starm tactic.

So you've got the only really popular left leaning newspaper, The Mirror, describing it as strong storm tactic. Uh Labour has plunged into open warfare last night after Prime Minister Keir Starmer torpedo at Andy Burnham's commons comeback. Um and and and every other front page is more or less in agreement. The mirror's not even flying in the opposite direction, it agrees. There's civil war on the cards. And I agree with that as well. I I mean the left of the party for want of a better

Description will be up in arms. The Labour Party is world class. when it comes to self immolation and self sabotage, there's barely a political party in history that's better at tearing itself to shreds over um uh details than the Labour Party, the Labour movement, you could argue. And and and Keir Starmer looks incredibly weak. This is not this is not a defence of Keir Starmer as as a leader or as a man. This is a defence of what he has done in these circumstances. So, they, um...

The the producer's written on the screen that another Tory has defected to reform. I'm going to suggest to you it's a sitting are they a sitting MP at the moment or did they stay in at the last election? I I'm going to suggest to you that you will be able to guess I'm not even going to do a multiple choice. So another Tory has defected to Farage's outfit. And I if I said to you it is the single most obvious defection from sitting MPs. Who would you respond and say?

Um I I just do it as a text. Don't try not to look at the news. Uh we haven't got a bulletin coming up. I'll come back after the break and tell you who it actually is. But if you had to pick somebody who um is incredibly vile about immigrants Has the brains of a biscuit. and routinely soils themselves with um opinions that are very, very, very farage adjacent.

which sitting Tory MP Would you reach I' no I'm gonna give you another one as well, somebody who was in several very, very senior positions with direct responsibility for precisely the policies that Nigel Farage never stops moaning about. So if you had to hire someone from the Tory party whose fingerprints were all over All of the things you spend your life moaning about, everything from refugee policy right through to hotels um repurposed hotels for asylum seekers.

with a little side order of, oh well you can't really be British if you weren't this, that or the other or you can't really be English if you're British or di If you had to pick the single best candidate for all of those things, which one would you pick? It's not Marc Francois and I think that Jonathan Gullis has already gone, hasn't he? So you can't have him either and he's not even an MP.

So if I give you one more clue, I'm just gonna see what happens to my inbo no, you're getting there. There you go. So i in many ways it's a choice between two people. Especially the bit where I say they have had very senior roles in delivering precisely the problems. I I should go to the break, shouldn't I? And stop playing Or should I tell them who it is? Y I can't come back after the break and do it. Can I come back after the break and do it? No? All right.

It's John Major. It's not John Major, it's Sueella Braverman. Um I think I should probably apologise to Sir John Major there because as uh as Dennis points out, despite that immediate retraction, if I were John Major I'd sue you for defamation, James. It's just a joke.

Uh of course John Major hasn't defected to reform. Uh you have to pick someone who is not very bright, incredibly hypocritical, um somehow uh uh curiously dedicated to denigrating and maligning immigrants, even though her parents were immigrants. And uh also heavily responsible for all of the policies and that the country currently finds itself in. In fact, I I wonder whether there's a correlation to be drawn between the people that have defected to Nigel Farage's outfit.

from the Tories who actually did or I mean,'cause Jenrik I thought would take some beating, having been an actual immigration minister, and then to join Farage so he can say nothing to do with me, I was just an immigration minister in the last government. Sweet of Bravman was actually home secretary. And then of course she had to oh I get I get confused now.

I do actually get confused, I get them a little bit mixed up with each other, the Jenriks and the Bravermans and the rest of them. I I I I can't I can't remember. I thought that Suela Bravama's husband had quit reform because they were so rude about his wife. Anyway, there's a new tradition in place now, and that is you you can be first in the queue if you want, you have to find and send them to me on Blue Sky.

'Cause I can't see things if you send them to the studio. Can you find the examples of Braverman being very rude about Farage or Farage being very rude about Braverman? Because they'll be out there. They always are. Uh the scale of the hypocrisy of these characters is absolutely visible from space. But if you're quick you could be first. You could be the ones to do the online social media um

What's it called? Archaeology and you will have the time that Suela Braverman said, Nigel Farage is a big smelly poo poo, or the time that Nigel Farage said, Suela Braverman smells like Marmite. I don't know what it was that they said about each other, but they did say something, I'm certain of it, and you could be the first to find it. Um we're supposed to be having a phone in about Keir Starmer. And the question of whether or not he could have handled the threat from Andy Burnham any better

Or be it that what he's done is awful, it's the least awful of the four options that he could have set in motion. Essentially the two options being do you block him from running or do you let him run? Uh a little bit more on this latest defe if you care, really. Should we do the other tradition? Shouldn't so have we got all those clips that we have to play out every time a Tory defects to the um

Uh d to the to the reform outfit. We've got a little selection of clips have we got there? I'll do that after we hear from Peter in Saint Albans on the question of Keir Starmer blocking Burnham. What do we think, Peter? Well, I am profoundly shocked by this. And I'll tell you why, because the latest polling which electoral calculus have given us is that Labour are at seventeen percent, which is one of the lowest ever recorded Labour percentage. nineteen ten. So it's an extremely similar thing.

I think and we know that. Oh, hang on, just to check and and I'm not going to stop you from making your case, this isn't about has Keir Starmer done the right thing from Keir Starmer's point of view, this is about why you want a leadership challenge and you think Andy Burnham should be the next leader. Is it? Am I am I right? I think you can just say yes. It's not a trick question. I d just want to be clarified. I think they're trying to block him because they know he's a he's a future leader.

Yeah. But I wanted to just explain why I think this is a historical point. Uh well I think this is a dangerous historical point for the Labour movement. Because I think what they're doing is they're about to reject a a very good politician who's sharp, smart, appealing to working class voters, is called the King of the North and he's not called the King of the North for no reason. and with Labour at this dreadful polling, he is the man I believe who who could challenge

Um Do you remember what happened last time he ran for leader? Sorry. Do you remember what happened last time he ran for leader? Uh well, we were overpowered by all that Corbinism and a lot of No, I meant him specifically. And he was a bit rubbish. I think probably by his own account. He's been on full disclosure. If I most of these um uh most of the players in this

have been on foot. So I'm a little bit surprised. So I mean, A, you you phoned the wrong show'cause there's and and that's fine,'cause you know, you can't have it both ways if you're me. I have to let you come on and say these things because A they're interesting and B They're authentic and sincere. But it's not what we're talking about. I g I gave you the options that Keir Starmer had.

And shutting down a possible leadership challenge is a clever thing to do if you want to stay as leader, Peter. So you're agreeing that he's done the right thing from his own point of view. From his point of view but not from the greater labour movement. Well no, no, not from your point of view about the greater labour movement. So I I think a change of leader might be a good thing. That doesn't mean that it should be Andy Burnham.

Well he's a bit of a drama queen, isn't he? Or king. What I'm trying to say that he's he's the he's their um he's the uh And if I just voted for him to be mayor two years ago and he said it's the best job in the world? James, I agree, but politics is not a is not a nice gentleman's game, is it? There comes a point. There comes a point in

There comes a historic point when the Labour movement has to say can we go on like this? And the voting is just so dire. It's not voting, it's polling. But I mean, and there will be votes in the event of a by election. And how do you think Labour would perform in that by election if it had gone ahead? Given their seventeen percent polling at the moment being the lowest since nineteen ten. I th I think in the Greater Manchester area clearly he is a very popular

figure and a and has demonstrated his skills. And the and and the mayoral election that he wouldn't be in? What what if what if uh b the enemies of the Labour Party got in as mayor of Manchester? That would be on on you, wouldn't it? And and and if Labour lost that, that would be what, in the context of what's good and what's bad for the Labour movement? The broader Labour movement, as you call it.

Possible. But I think that area would not uh that would be a bit like London choosing re reform, I think. No, according to the polling, which is what you began your contribution by. Sighting. Oh dear. I'm just trying to make pause. No, I listen, I don't think you're wrong necessarily. I I mean I I don't I don't think this is a phoning about um whether or not Andy Burnham would be a bet lead better leader. It's about whether or not um

Uh Starmer has done the right thing, but th the events have been rather overtaken by Suela Bravman's desperate attempt to get back to the front line of politics. Um I think it was her husband, I've double checked. I think her husband quit the party after Zia Yusuf said hideous things about her. But remember none of that matters in the context of um

uh self advancement and and and self promotion. We'll catch up with Natasha after the news bulletin on yet another defection to the reform from the lunatic fringe of the Tory party. I I'm almost beginning to Chalk this up as a great week for Cammy Badenock. I mean it's almost if she made a list of the MPs she'd most like to get rid of. Who do you genuine question this?

If Cammy Badenot made a list of the MPs she'd most like to get rid of, who do you think would be on it? And if we put Robert Jenrich and Swell Braverman at the top of it, who'd be third,'cause it'll probably be them next Monday. In the meantime, um on the subject of whether or not this defection will trigger a by election, here is something that night well, I'll play it to you after the headlines with Amelia Cox.

It's twelve thirty-three. You're listening to James O'Brien on LBC. We're um Uh is it forty? Forty more defections and Ed Davy will be leader of the opposition. Natasha Clark, LBC's political editor, is here with the least shocking news of the year so far.

Yes, James, when I heard you say there was another defection just a few minutes ago and you'll never guess who it is, I thought it's gotta be her, right? It's gotta be some Anna Bravman. This has been somebody obviously the former Conservative Home Secretary that people have been uh too tipping to to go to the Reform Party for even longer than Robert Jenrick. She is probably more to the right than he is.

And obviously we've been hearing from her this morning. She has been speaking at a event which Nigel Farage was at speaking about help for veterans. I think we can hear a little bit of what she had to say just a few moments ago. Thank you, Nigel, for that wonderful introduction. I feel like I've come home. Thank you. And I gotta say what an honour it is to be with all of you gallant, noble, brave service men and women.

You've put your country first. You've sacrificed. You've given us everything. And from the bottom of my heart I want to say thank you. Thank you for everything you've done. She's also been warning today against managed decline. She's been saying that immigration she feels is out of control. Public services on their knees. People don't feel safe.

But like we say, and like we've been saying, every single major Tory defection, you know, is this uh you know, turning reform into just a party of, you know, former Tory MPs. When does that line get crossed? Nigel Farage has been saying for the last couple of weeks that he's not going to let anywhere else Yn ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud.

making that jump before that deadline, James. But um I I mean two thoughts. Neither of us are in the room, um uh uh but I one wonders quite how the uh servicemen and women gathered respond to the fact that Nigel Farage was

To malign the memory of of Danish soldiers, French soldiers, uh soldiers from anywhere else in the NATO coalition. Um but also, who do they think was in charge for the fourteen years prior to Keir Starmer becoming Prime Minister? Because Jenrik was merely an immigration minister. was Heim Secretary. yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n.

want in the Reform Party at all. You're exactly right. She embodies everything that they didn't like about the last Conservative government. She was the home secretary, she failed to get a grip on immigration, she failed to get a grip on what many people in the Conservative Party called the small boats crisis. Um and she is absolutely the person that they want nowhere near.

Somebody who who you know, like Nigel Farage, you says that they want to to change Britain and and step up and be radically different and radically reformed. I cannot see how many Reform uh MPs currently and obviously this makes her Reform's eighth MP, um, adding to to to their sort of collection, if you will. Um but there must be some people in reform and I have spoken to some who are genuinely worried about how far they go from being

the establishment sorry, the anti establishment party to becoming the establishment party. And I do think that that moment with someone like Swella Bravman, you'd like to say you could argue that you've just done. Robert Generate was only a an immigration minister. He was also yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n yw'n So was Suella Bravman. Why are you now voting for this party that's that's that's turning yourself into just an old party for you?

Rydyn ni'n gwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud ymwneud? Yeah, that's right. And that also, you know. Started off this swirl of speculation.

It's just good, isn't it? You just you can't predict it. However, it's just like a like a trolley going either way, this way or that way. But absolutely that was exactly why this uh sort of set of leadership speculation was was set off by the fact that Suela Bravman's husband had joined the Reform Party in the first place. She said she wasn't gonna do it. She's now jumped shit. Um who's next then? Go on, put a few pence on it.

Oh that's a good question. Well, we were being told I think it was th the week before last before n by Nigel Farage that there was a big labour defector coming. I wonder where that's uh that was last Tuesday. We must have missed it. We must have missed it, I know. I'll tell you in private'cause I don't want to embarrass or indeed libel anybody, but a couple of the names that I heard as possibles in that front were

Rydw i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd i'n mynd

as recently as Friday. Yeah, and um his response to the Greenland issue by basically saying, well it actually, you know, it would be a safer world if America did have control of Greenland. Absolutely the opposite of what we've been seeing, James, from every single other party leader in Britain who

has swung in beside ke b behind Keir Starmer in in his attempts to try to basically stand up for Britain, stand up for Greenland's uh and Denmark's interests. Nigel Farage has absolutely not been doing that. Um thank you.

Uh I I had uh a a visitor from one of our most committed listeners on Friday. Who said hello outside the studio. He was very taken with your trainers. My training. Yeah, she saw you on Friday as well, Stephen and Milton Keynes, who s who who routinely sends me jokes via text that I steal. I'm a lovely bloke. Oh, is that what it was? There you go. Yeah, you see them in Milton Keynes they'd be fashionable. Thank you, Natasha. It's uh twelve thirty nine you're listening to

James are right on LBC. A lot of you are wondering whether or not there'll be a by election. Well, let's ask Nigel, shall we? Let's ask the man himself. Well I was leader of UKIP. Back in twenty thirteen and fourteen, I had several Conservative Members of the Parliament who wanted to defect and sit as UKIP. I said to all of them, the only acceptable way you can do that

is to resign your seat and hold a by election. And two of them, Douglas Carswell and Mark Reckless, did exactly that and indeed went on to win the by elections. For the others I said it's no go, it's not right. It is dishonourable. And this really is the dishonourable member for Berry South, Christian Wakeford. It is a complete insult to voters.

For MPs to have the arrogance to think that it's them they voted for, when the truth is, most of us vote for or against the main party leaders. And it amazed me that Boris Johnson in response didn't even ask for the man to put himself forward for a by election, you see, the truth, folks, is they're nearly all not all but nearly all, career politicians, you the voters, are just useful to them once every few years. It's all about them.

Ooh, do we listen to that again? That's obviously not from today, that's from millions and million uh sorry, three years ago. Nigel Farage explaining why it's absolutely the case that anybody defecting from one main party to his party, whatever it's called this week. um would have to be uh uh uh subject to a by election, would have to have a by election and not to do that is to use his own words, dishonourable.

Um and uh career down with career politicians, says a man who, uh apart from a brief foray, is a fairly rubbish commodities trader. um, has been a career politician. So I don't know whether he is rubbish or not. All I know is that the last company he was involved with received a winding up order from Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs over unpaid taxes.

Um but he's made up for that since with all of the um gold bullion deals and the and the um cameo recordings that he does and the seventeen uh streams of income that he failed to declare to the um House of Commons. Officers. Uh just it was discovered last week. But th uh so so you should by rights have now three by elections on the way, one from

Honest Bob Jenrick's constituency, one from Suela Braverman's constituency, and one in uh Danny Kruger's constituency. I think we will actually listen to Oh, hang on a minute. Apparently he's he's d ooh, he's wrong in. Okay, well you never know how these conversations are gonna go, but um uh Nigel Farage W w what w welcome to the programme. My message to you is clear, plain and simple. Never trust a Tory.

Did you get that? I'll repeat it. Never trust a Tory. They will always let you down, they will always betray you. Speaking of trust and betrayal, there was this bloke just three years ago who explained what should happen when people defect from the Tory party to to his party. Do you think we could trust him?

Or is he somebody that will always betray you? When I was leader of UKIP back in twenty thirteen and fourteen, I had several Conservative members of the parliament who wanted to defect and sit as UKIP. I said to all of them, the only acceptable way you can do that is to resign your seat and hold a by election. And two of them, Douglas Carswell and Mark Reckless, did exactly that.

And indeed went on to win the by elections. For the others I said it's no go, it's not right, it is dishonourable. And this really is the dishonourable member for Berry South. Christian Wakeford. It is a complete insult to voters for MPs to have the arrogance to think that it's them they voted for, when the truth is most of us vote for or against the main party leaders. And it amazed me that Boris Johnson in response didn't even ask

For the man to put himself forward for a by election, you see, the truth, folks, is they're nearly all not all, but nearly all, career politicians, you the voters, are just useful to them once every few years. It's all about them.

It's no go, it's not right, it's a complete insult to voters, it's reform UK policy.

Um before you go, Nigel, e any word on all of those former school friends queuing up to accuse you of hideous racism and anti Semitism. Fiona is in Beaconsfield to steer us back to the question of whether or not the Prime Minister could have handled Andy Burnham's desire to get back into the House of Commons any better, given that whatever he did was going to be disastrous, was this the least disastrous course that he could have taken, Fiona?

I don't think it is. I want to stick to your question'cause I heard you talk to the gentleman before me and say that he didn't. Well he didn't, did he? I'm not don't make me sound like a meanie. He didn't know it was a question about could Kirstama Swella Braverman and Nigel Farage, so I've got to like get my blood drinking. Hang on a minute. It's time you put put put yourself together for goodness' sake. Bird of Manning. Far and Carib, carry on.

So I I don't think he made the right decision by by blocking him because I think, as you say, he was in in an invidious position. I feel sorry for him in a way. Um I'm a mem I'm an ex member of the Labour Party. I left because of all of these shenanigans. It's it's been very it's been a very trying five years of my life. But anyway, um going back to um Starmer and Burnham.

Everyone knew within the Labour Party that Burnham was going to do this at some point and it was just a question of when. So they will have had a long time to have worked out what their response was going to be. So I'm not sure that I would agree that Andy Burnham did an honor honourable thing by applying, but I think that once he did apply that Starmer had they should have allowed him to to run because

I d I I think that he's he's still as weak he's he's still as weak by by not allowing him to run as he is by allowing him to run. But we now we may now lose an important by election in in in an important const you know, constituency and that's and I'm worried how this all leads to the your your first two hours of your programme, which were the right hours to concentrate on.

where, you know, we we're heading down a road to us gifting this country to reform and and where that ends up. I've got all my rocks, I've got my rocks, my hard places, my cliff faces and my brick walls mix mixed up'cause of course there will be a by election now that Labour could lose. Yeah. And if that happens,

Starmer any any defence of Sturmer today as having sort of recognised that the per we shouldn't let the perfect be the enemy of the good falls apart. Yep. And he could s he could stand as an independent. Some people are wondering, Andy you don't think so? No, absolutely not. But well I I just fairly unequivocal. He probably will now.

Well I don't I I don't know either. I don't know him well enough, but what I do know is from my my short time and trying to be a candidate myself is that what we are doing at the moment is not cutting through with the public. It's just not cutting through. And I've seen both Starmer speak many times, including with my twenty year old son, and I've seen I've seen Burnham speak.

And Burnham is the communicator, just like Angela Rayner was as well. He wouldn't have a a an untrammelled Shortly afterwards. sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n sy'n by elections as being a no go, it's not right, it's a complete insult to voters. So so so there it is. Thank you, Fiona. Up next and it been a little bit delayed by um Sue Bravman's latest attempt to um get back into the limelight.

How How They Broke Britain by Some Idiot is a really good book, actually, if you want to understand the mess that we're currently in. But all of these people who are now offering up the narrative that Britain is broken broke it. Uh you can tell that'cause they either get a chapter or several pages in in the actual text of how they broke Britain by

Yn ymwneudol yn all good bookshops. Yn ymwneudol, yw'n ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol. Yn ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol ymwneudol. Um recognising that immigration is not the biggest issue facing this country and for the massive majority of cases it isn't a negative, it's actually a positive. Yn ymwneud â phobl sy'n ymwneud â phobl sy'n ymwneud â phobl sy'n ymwneud â phobl sy'n ymwneud â phobl sy'n

in the country and removing the stranglehold that right wing media and secretly funded lobby groups masquerading as think tanks have upon much of public discourse. If you want to fix Britain that's what you gotta do first. Uh or of course you could carry on smashing your head against a brick wall in the hope that something different would happen next time compared to what happened last time.

Distruss and the time before that, Boris Johnson, and the time before that, Brexit, and the time before that austerity. It's twelve forty eight.

Twelve fifty one is the time. I spend a lot of time slagging off all the uh corruption and hideous hideous bias in the UK media. So I I'm delighted when I Have good news for you. I shared with you some time ago my enthusiasm for London Centric, a new platform set up by the journalist Jim Waterson, which powers Uh from strength to strength, picking up awards like they're going out of fashion.

To a few of the things that we care about. One, of course, is the corrupting power of social media and the way in which dishonesty and and lies and Propaganda goes almost entirely unchecked. Two is the fact that this can be quite a lucrative income stream for some people. And three is this growing narrative about London where where I've lived

since I was nineteen, um, being in some sort of terminal decline. Uh a a a a claim so completely at odds with observable reality that it is Still a little bit surprising that it's gained such a toehold until you realise the effort being put in to perpetrating those lies and the fact that it's only got a toehold among people that don't live here or never visit.

and Reform UK's candidate for mayor. That's about it, I think. There's very few people who live here or who regularly visit that recognise the portrayal of our capital. Jim Waterson is the editor of London centric. And um I'll just let you tell the story if that's all right, Jim. W what what alerted your what made your antennae twitch with regard to these Films on TikTok and what you discovered when you started digging into them.

Uh well this wonderful investative reporter Catherine Denkinson brought this in to me and she had identified an account on TikTok that was offering property tours of people's homes. It's a standard online format, look around this house. Except it had a very dark twist.

Over each one it said that this newly refurbished house had just been handed to asylum seekers, or to people straight off the boats from the channel, uh that ensues had been installed and that people were being given the keys and saying that they hated Britain as they received it.

And these were getting hundreds of thousands of views. The comments were filling up with people going, My son can't get a place to live, which is a very real problem. Uh that, you know, people say, I'm fuming that this is being handed over to those people and I haven't got any of it. And it was just lies. But it took us months of work to prove that. And this is really the problem. These accounts can spread wild claims, wind up people, and spread hate.

And it took us months of work to track out track down who connected all of them and it turned out that all of them had been let out by the same estate agency. before the before the front door opened. So I mean it's full on access, on fettered access to most of the properties, which no doubt prompted you to pay a visit to the Yeah though it took us

weeks to work out where the properties were. How did you do that? I mean without giving away any traits. No absolutely we we pioneered a new investigative technique called bin identification. Using the bins outside of each of the properties in the TikToks. The person had tried to hide their identity But we cross referenced the council bin colours.

uh with the front door numbers and then manually went along all the streets and sent reporters to do it. Wow. And that's how how Catherine managed to find the breakthrough. Have you alerted Bellingcat and Elliot Higgins to this new to this new journalistic tactical? I mean this this is a lot of work that we like to put a lot of work into our our stories rather than just accept what things are on face value. Um but when we went to the estate agent, they accepted

That within an hour they'd managed to get the account deleted. They say, well, look, it wasn't us, it's someone we know who mysteriously had access to all of these properties. But the bigger story here is that someone was getting access to dozens of properties across London.

Filming people's houses secretly, filming people's homes and uploading them with lies that they were being handed over to asylum seekers and illegal immigrants and getting hundreds and hundreds of thousands of clicks. And with the best will in the world, with the you know, the

Publicity we're getting here from doing this story with the stuff that I've published on London Centric, there's never going to be as many people reading our debunk of it to say that this is all lies. And all over the place we're seeing this now. You can just start a TikTok account, you can spread

all this hate and almost no comeuppance when it turns out to be rubbish. And the c and and it has the requisite sort of um music in the background, the background music and the and the portentous voiceovers. Announcing that another property has been handed to asylum seekers.

True and widespread, they wouldn't need to lie about it. And and the second is that the rules and regulations that are in place would make it a crimin a legal impossibility anyway, for for anybody who's currently having an asylum application process to be handed any form of property of of of the d of the type that Uh that's on show here. Um so so

Money? Is it I mean uh it it's a difficult one, isn't it? Because I think there are quite a lot of racists on social media, particularly since Elon Musk bought X, who may not actually be racist. They've just realised and some of the investigations have shown this to be true.

Um there's a lot of money to be made from telling racist lies on social media. When we confronted the estate agent who was letting out all these properties, the person who managed to get it deleted very quickly, who who won't tell us the individual running it but says that they know them.

They did speculate that one of the motivations might be, well, you can make money from filming these clips. And that's the case. That when you're scrolling through that thing, when you're flicking through Instagram reels or TikTok, getting angered by something. that if you watch for long enough, that will then send money to the creator that's making it. And this is the sort of model that we're doing.

Our journalism, which is i you know, really, really painstaking, will never make as much money as someone who just sends out a load of clips to anger you. Well well although hopefully we can throw a few new subscribers your way if you if you head towards London eccentric. Um uh y y you can find out how you can subscribe to this brilliant

new resource. We approach Smart Letter States for comment ourselves, obviously, uh in addition to what you have done. Smart Letter States, they told us, is not connected with the TikTok account which was recently drawn to our attention. Following our investigation we were able to identify the individual who we believed was responsible for the filming. We spoke with the individual and the account was immediately removed. The agency has cut all ties with the individual involved.

And we are prepared to speak to the authorities should they be interested in speaking with us. Do we have any idea how much?

cash you can make doing this sort of thing. I mean if if y we do, weirdly from some of the MP's declarations, we can see someone like Nigel Farage or Rupert Lowe is making thousands and thousands of pounds on Twitter. If you're a TikTok creator that's flying This could be a really nice income for someone and around the world there's uh farms of sort of actual humans creating Rage Bait content.

to wind up people about the state of London, about the state of the UK, uh because it makes it makes proper money. Because this is what people watch. You this is what grabs your attention. Everything is basically okay in a city, doesn't do clicks. everything is going to pieces and its societal collapse does.

Great work. Um we should probably add in conclusion that the username on the account that's now been deleted nor did two Reform UK. Indeed that that was the username, although there's nothing to suggest that there was any association. Between them and the political party, the algorithm would presumably act upon that and people drawn towards reform UK were the target audience for people drawn towards these kind of racist propaganda lies on?

Social media but I I can say that you couldn't possibly comment. That's very much your supposition. Jim Wattson, thank you very much from London. So what are you on next? What's up next? Uh we'll be Sticking on this story, uh we've got lots of strange scams and scandals coming up uh in the next few weeks though. And you could do a lot worse than subscribe to London Centric today. That is it from me.

For today, if you missed any of it, you can listen back on our free Global Player app or the new LBC app, where you can stay up to date on all the top stories and opinions, put your news categories in the order you want. You can even pause and rewind live radio. Can you believe that, Jim? You can pause and re light why.

They're there. You can listen to a range of the last ten minutes all over. Just the future. Download the official LBC app for free from your app store now. Tom Swalbert with you at four. But now it's time for Sheila Fogerty.