UK conservatives worried about migration, free-speech issues turn to once fringe politico Robinson

Reeling from a humiliating election defeat a year ago, some British conservatives are now getting behind the leadership of political outsider and anti-migrant firebrand Tommy Robinson.

The 42-year-old activist, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, has been involved in national or far-right politics for roughly the past 15 years. But he appeared to really burst onto the international political scene earlier this month by leading the massive “Unite the Kingdom” rally in London.

An estimated 150,000 demonstrators joined to air their concerns about free speech, preserving British heritage and migrants – particularly the increasing number of would-be refugees and illegal migrants crossing the English Channel. 

Among their chants were anti-refugee slogans and calls for the U.K. parliament to be dissolved – amid clashes with police and overwhelming a smaller “Stand Up to Racism” counter-protest held nearby. By the end of the day, 25 people had been arrested and dozens were hospitalized.

But the rally – and its size – also appeared to speak to large global concern about such issues and voters' interest in more nationalistic political leaders to resolve them after other, more mainstream leaders have not.  

The rally came just days before President Donald Trump traveled to London for a three-day state visit hosted by U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer, the center-left Labor Party leader.

Robinson has found support among influential figures on the populist right, including billionaire owner of Tesla and X Elon Musk, who warned of violence if Starmer did not step down, and California tech billionaire Robert Shillman, who was a strong backer of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated in Utah on Sept. 10.

“There’s a massive incentive on the left to import voters,” Musk said. “If they can’t convince their nation to vote for them, they’re going to import people from other nations to vote for them. It’s a strategy that will succeed if it’s not stopped.”

In his address to the rally, Robinson went even further.

“It’s not just Britain that’s being invaded, it’s not just Britain that’s being raped,” Robinson shouted to cheers. “Every single western nation faces the same problem – an orchestrated, organized invasion and replacement of European citizens is happening.”

The latest developments come a year after conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak was swept from office in a lopsided vote that made Starmer the U.K.’s first left-of-center prime minister since 2010.

Robinson is an unlikely figure to unite British conservatives.

Born in England but holding Irish citizenship, Robinson once held membership in the now-inactive neo-fascist British National Party, the extremist British Freedom Party, and was briefly associated with the “counter-jihad” For Britain Movement. All are widely considered part of the U.K.’s political fringe.

In 2021, a court ruled that Robinson had publicly libeled Jamal Hijazi, a 15-year-old Syrian refugee student (Robinson said the boy “violently attacks young English girls in his school”) and was ordered to pay £100,000 (around $135,000) in damages. When he repeated the claims, he was found in contempt of court and was sentenced to 18 months behind bars.

He was released in May, four months early, and immediately stepped up his activism leading up to the massive Sept. 13 rally.

Whether such a polarizing figure can emerge as a unifying leader is uncertain. Even within established right-of-center political parties, Robinson is viewed with circumspect. But it is also clear he has helped energize a section of the country’s electorate that had been licking its wounds since last year’s dramatic election losses.