Nigel Farage Compares UK to North Korea in US Congress Speech

Nigel Farage, leader of the Reform UK party, testified before the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, sharply criticizing Britain's Online Safety Act and broader censorship laws, which he claimed have transformed the UK into an authoritarian state comparable to North Korea. He highlighted the imprisonment of Lucy Connolly for a racially charged tweet following a mass stabbing, describing her sentence as disproportionate despite her deleting the post shortly after, and the arrest of comedy writer Graham Linehan at Heathrow for social media posts critical of transgender ideology. Farage warned that such censorship measures threaten free speech and innovation in the West and could damage trade relations between the UK and the U.S. His comments sparked backlash from UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, who accused Farage of being unpatriotic and lobbying for sanctions against the UK, and from U.S. Democrat Congressman Jamie Raskin, who dismissed Farage's claims of a free speech crisis in Britain. Farage argued that these developments undermine the foundational principles of democracy and freedom, urging the U.S. government to pressure the UK to uphold liberty values. The debate underscored a transatlantic clash over free speech rights and regulatory approaches to online content.