SCOTT SIMON, HOST:
Britain's far-right Reform UK Party, led by Nigel Farage, an on-again, off-again friend of President Trump's, had been leading polls until recently. The party's faced a series of scandals over donations. NPR's Lauren Frayer reports on the latest one, an undercover sting operation by journalists.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: How many would you like?
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: Oysters, please. Shall we do four each?
NIGEL FARAGE: Pointless.
(LAUGHTER)
FARAGE: I'll have half a dozen, please.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: That's amazing.
LAUREN FRAYER, BYLINE: This video shows Nigel Farage lunching on oysters and champagne with two men he thought were friendly donors. The men brag about being behind polls that showed Farage's Reform Party in the lead last spring. It looked like the polls were commissioned by national newspapers, but the men said they paid for them, which would violate electoral rules.
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UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: I was thrilled to be able to pick up the tab for the polls that you had...
FARAGE: Yes.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: ...Commissioned.
FARAGE: That was great.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: It was that - and the third poll...
FARAGE: It worked. Boom.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #3: Right.
FRAYER: You can hear Farage on video thanking the men.
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FARAGE: Bang for the buck.
FRAYER: Bang for buck, Farage says. The fake donors are an investigative journalist and an actor posing as a U.S.-based father and his U.K.-based son. They say they're routing foreign money to Farage's party, which would also be illegal. In another part of the half hour video which aired Thursday on Britain's Channel 4 TV, the Reform Party's head of policy, James Orr, says of these donations, am I going to tell anyone? Obviously not.
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JAMES ORR: Am I going to tell anyone? Obviously, you know, that this is not (ph). The reality is we can easily get away with it, honestly (ph).
FRAYER: We can easily get away with it, he says. And then he whispers that the country's Electoral Commission is...
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ORR: It's completely useless. I'll just say dumb and ineffective and...
FRAYER: ...Completely useless, dumb and ineffective. Orr is a close friend of Vice President JD Vance's. He resigned within hours of this video airing. So has another party official. The party itself denies any wrongdoings - says it's investigating. This sting hit in the middle of the party's National Convention. Farage was forced to divert his keynote speech to address this.
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FARAGE: Let me be clear. The party has done nothing wrong. Taken no illegal money. In fact, no money was taken at all.
FRAYER: He says the video shows loose pub talk. He calls this an exercise in entrapment by left-wing climate activists. The journalists involved previously worked at the Center for Climate Reporting, a nonprofit focused on environmental issues. Farage's political opponents have referred this video to police.
MUJTABA RAHMAN: It's hugely damaging. Reform UK is in a state of crisis today.
FRAYER: Mujtaba Rahman at the risk analysis firm Eurasia Group, says while the far-right gains ground elsewhere in Europe, here in the U.K...
RAHMAN: Reform's numbers are going backwards. There's a real question and concern about corruption and party financing. There's a lot of opacity around where the party is getting its funding from. There's a stench around Reform at the moment.
FRAYER: He says these money scandals, coupled with fresh support for mainstream parties, could mean Farage has peaked already.
Lauren Frayer, NPR News, London. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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