Farage
given free team of US PR advisers by former Bannon aide’s firm
Reform UK
leader received support for his American activities after becoming an MP but
has not declared the services as a benefit
Rowena Mason
Whitehall editor
Thu 17 Oct
2024 17.00 BST
Nigel Farage
has used a team of three US advisers to help him with “perception management”
and public relations in America, as well as with settling a $3,500 hotel bill
this summer, new documents show.
The official
filings, made in the US, reveal that the leader of Reform UK and MP for Clacton
has been assisted at least 15 times by CapitalHQ, a firm led by Alexandra
Preate, who is a former press spokesperson for the controversial former Donald
Trump strategist Steve Bannon.
Its work for
Farage has become public because CapitalHQ had to register with the government
under “foreign agent” laws in the US. Preate and two of her employees have
declared they were paid salaries by CapitalHQ while carrying out activities on
behalf of a “foreign principal” after Farage became an MP in July.
According to
the documents, CapitalHQ was hired to take on activities for Farage including
“promotion, perception management, public relations, speeches, appearances,
communications, travel, accommodation and logistics and other political
activities in furtherance of political interests of the foreign principal”. It
describes his address as the House of Commons in London.
CapitalHQ
has taken on the work without payment, and its services have been given to
Farage free. However, Farage does not register CapitalHQ’s services on the MPs’
register of interests as a benefit in kind – nor the fact that CapitalHQ
settled a $3,531.10 hotel bill for him at the Hilton Garden Inn Milwaukee
during the Republican National Convention, which ran from 14 to 19 July.
He did
register £32,000 of costs associated with the US trip paid for by a British
cryptocurrency investor, Christopher Harborne.
MPs are
required to register any benefits that relate to their membership of the
Commons or parliamentary or political activities if provided by a source
outside the UK, whether they be provided free or at concessionary rates.
Asked
whether he had sought advice about registering the free PR services from
Preate’s firm and whether he should have done so, a spokesperson for Farage
told the Guardian: “Nigel Farage is a politician, not an accountant.” Preate
has been approached for comment.
Steve Bannon
is in prison after being found guilty of contempt charges, and is due to be
released this month. Photograph: David Dee Delgado/Getty Images
The
barrister Jolyon Maugham, the director of the Good Law Project, said Farage
should say why the activities had not been registered.
He said:
“The registration documents raise serious questions around the rightwing forces
powering Farage and why he seems not to have declared the support he received
to parliament.”
Preate is a
longtime associate of Bannon, and was interviewed by the January 6 committee
about events in the lead-up to the storming of the Capitol building in
Washington.
In her
testimony, given in April 2022, she said Bannon was a client and that she had
been present with Trump at a meeting in the former president’s hotel the day
before the riots took place. She described being “horrified and depressed” by
the events of January 6 in her evidence.
Bannon is in
prison, serving four months for refusing to comply with a subpoena from the
January 6 committee, and is due to be released this month.
The
strategist, a former editor of the hard-right news outlet Breitbart, was
convicted of contempt charges at trial in July 2022. He was accused of refusing
to appear for a deposition and of refusing to provide documents to the
committee in response to a subpoena.
He served as
Trump’s chief strategist for the first seven months of his presidency.
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