In the wake of UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage’s resignation on Monday, Breitbart London’s Editor in Chief Raheem Kassam has told the BBC that he is considering a bid for the party’s leadership.
Speaking with Evan Davis on Newsnight, Kassam refused to rule out running for the position as other candidates considered their bids.
Davis asked Kassam, “Are you running for leader?” to which Kassam replied, “Maybe. Maybe. We’ll see”.
UKIP’s Assembly Member Peter Whittle, who joined Kassam for the segment, is also believed to be running, as is Steven Woolfe MEP, Paul Nuttall MEP, Diane James MEP, and others.
The news follows the response from Douglas Carswell MP’s reaction to Mr. Farage’s resignation.
Initially, Mr. Carswell tweeted a smiley face with sunglasses, which many in the party’s upper echelons took offence to considering how Mr. Farage took the party to being the third largest in UK politics, as well as leading the country out of the European Union.
Speaking later to the BBC, Mr. Carswell said that UKIP should have no role in post-Brexit negotiations, and said that his Conservative Party colleagues Michael Gove, Chris Grayling, Daniel Hannan, and Matthew Elliott should lead the way forward.
He also said the referendum was won despite, rather than because of UKIP and Mr. Farage.
But Kassam hit back against those claims tonight on Newsnight.
When asked about the famed ‘Breaking Point’ poster, Kassam said it was poor execution, but the right message: that the EU has failed to control its borders.
“I think the Breaking Point poster looked clumsy… I think how it was executed was very bad. But actually the message was fine. That was a real picture from southern Europe from 2015. Nobody complained when it was on the front page of the Independent or the Guardian… The message was mixed up. It did not make clear what it was talking about and that was the failure of the European Union to manage migration. What coming onto in terms of tone is execution and professionalism, something I spoke about last year when I left my position.”
His sentiments were echoed by Margot Parker MEP who joined the programme live from the European Parliament in Strasbourg.
And speaking of Mr. Farage’s speech in the Brussels parliament last week, Kassam called it “magnificent”.
“You have to have context behind this. If you have been inside the chamber and watched proceedings, you know that they are always giving it to each other. There are all these robust exchanges and it is actually pretty funny. And they go out smoking and drinking with each other after it.”
You can watch the full clip above.
Listen to Raheem Kassam discuss this on Breitbart News Daily on SiriusXM:
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