Nigel Farage said on Thursday that he was powerless to deselect Reform UK candidates who say that Britain should have done a deal with Hitler or that Islam equates to Nazism.
Challenged about the social media views of some of the people standing as MPs for his party, which is hard on the heels of the Tories in opinion polls, the Brexit figurehead said it was too late to deselect them ahead of the General Election on July 4.
In an LBC phone-in with Nick Ferrari, Mr Farage said his candidate in Bexhill and Battle was “blooming stupid” for saying that Britain should have stayed neutral against Nazi Germany in World War II.
Other Reform UK candidates have railed against vaccine makers as “Nazi armament companies” and argued that the Covid pandemic was a deliberately engineered “health Holocaust”.
He added of the various candidates: “I can disown them, but they are legally selected. They are legally on the ballot. I can disown them, but they are legally [selected].
“I may well do that (disavow them). I haven’t had time to think. I've been doing this job nine days,” he said.
“A lot of the stuff you're criticising is how ordinary folk down the pub speak.”
The party leader claimed that many people unwittingly “like” offensive content online, after The Times reported that nearly one in 10 of Reform UK candidates are Facebook “friends” with British fascist leader Gary Raikes.
The call-in took place the morning after Mr Farage attended a London fundraiser for Donald Trump, after claiming that he had an offer of a job from the convicted Republican frontrunner only to supplant Richard Tice as Reform UK leader instead and run as an MP in Clacton.
He alleged that protesters who have dogged him on the campaign trail were “organised” by the Soros Foundation - which is a frequent target of antisemitic conspiracy theories online - and that Black Lives Matter were a “bunch of crooks”.
Asked if he felt scared after attacks on the campaign trail by milkshake and rocks, he said he felt “thoughtful” - but revealed that for security reasons, he now never travels by train.
But Mr Farage vowed to persist, after he declared his intention to engineer a reverse takeover of the Conservatives after a Labour win in the election, insisting that the polls were close to a “tipping point” for his party.
He said: “I would be prepared to lead the centre-right in this country, a centre-right that stands up for small business, a centre-right that believes in borders, a centre-right that isn’t scared of standing up for the British people.”
However, several LBC callers took issue with the Reform UK leader’s characterisation of his party as “centre-right”. One called him “Tommy Robinson in a suit” as he accused him of Islamophobia.
Mr Farage was also accused of telling a “pack of lies” by a street cleaner in Oldham for claiming that there are no English speakers in areas of the town in Greater Manchester. The politician was unable to name any of the streets in question.
