Could home-made videos spell disaster for the Brexit Party’s slick image?
It’s been quite a week for the Brexit Party. On Friday, their candidate for Batley and Spen resigned after HOPE Not Hate revealed that she had fabricated parts of her CV and claimed to be a spirit guide from a distant star. Then on Sunday, their candidate for South Thanet had a car-crash interview in which he was interrogated about his belief that the EU was founded on the ‘subjugation of women’ and signed treaties on the ruins of ancient temples.

With such a questionable vetting process, it’s no surprise that the Brexit Party has demanded that their candidates stop producing their own campaign materials. Unfortunately for them – and lucky for us – the Brexit Party candidate for Brentwood and Ongar has already been busy making some downright strange campaign videos with his friend Tom Begley. You know you’re in for a treat when the candidate misspells the name in the first few seconds of a video:

This was just a soft-launch, however, and by the time they uploaded their second video they’d nailed the spelling of Brexit. This time around it was the candidate’s own name that let them down:

But then a few weeks later they went back to Bexit:

The dream team were ready to tackle a new approach for their third video, with extensive use of green screen and sound effects – the air-raid sirens at the start of the video really gives a good feel for the strangeness to come:

Among the many highlights of the video is an electoral graph that pays no heed to the established colour-coding of political parties, and a map that appears to show the landmass of the UK itself being shifted into the North Atlantic:

But as funny as these these videos are, Moses Etienne has very serious questions to answer about his relationship with Tom Begley. Their extensive and exclusive recording history – seven videos in total – suggests they know each other well. But Mr Begley has a number of extreme and offensive posts on his Facebook profile, including shares of antisemitic posts about ‘Rothschild Zionist Israel’ and Islamophobic memes about a ‘Muslim invasion of Europe’:

Is Mr Begley assisting this campaign in an official capacity, or just as a friend? The voters of Brentwood & Ongar deserve to know the truth about Mr Etienne’s views – and the people he chooses to associate with – before they place their votes.

You can find out more about the Brexit Party – and how to beat them – by reading our factsheet here.