All of a sudden, a transatlantic trend: populist leaders who promised to slash bloated budgets are instead cutting ties with their efficiency tsars.
Elon Musk, world’s richest man and ex-presidential adviser, and Zia Yusuf, former Reform UK chairman, have succumbed to the same fate. The manner in which their shared destiny was realised — and the synchronicity of the timing — all felt somehow preordained. Both Musk and Yusuf were deep-pocketed donors, thrust onto the political frontline by their preferred populist doyen with no meaningful experience to prepare them.
Yusuf resigned as Reform chair on Thursday in a curt and self-congratulatory tweet. It was unmistakably Musk-esque: he had concluded that his “time” would be better spent elsewhere. Musk voiced a similar sentiment this week, albeit in somewhat starker language.
There are other notable differences. Musk is the richest individual in the world; Yusuf is just very rich. In his capacity as Doge (Department of government efficiency) chief, Musk wielded a chainsaw across the US federal government. Yusuf, as head of Reform’s Doge copycat, barely stepped foot in Kent County Council.
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And yet, together, their coincident exits speak to an inherent instability at the heart of the populist-tech bro alliance — and how the personalities that populate populist movements conflict with, and conspire against, each other.
This impulse to self-destruction has claimed the former Reform chairman. The optics are far from ideal: the man tasked with “professionalising” the party has been hounded out of it by a distinctly amateurish saga.
After all, just 30 hours passed between Sarah Pochin’s intervention at prime minister’s questions and Yusuf’s resultant resignation. The row that consumed Reform this week was contrived, effectively, from thin air; it has cost Farage a valuable asset and reignited a debate about his party’s inadequacies.
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On Wednesday afternoon, Pochin, the Reform MP for Runcorn and Helsby, urged Keir Starmer to “follow the lead of France, Denmark, Belgium and others” in banning the burqa. The House of Commons crackled with criticism. But two distinct “hear, hears”, courtesy of Reform’s Richard Tice and Lee Anderson, cut through.
The crucial moment came moments later: a Reform spokesperson clarified that a burqa ban is not in fact party policy. The statement undermined Pochin — but it was never directly echoed by any of Reform’s top brass. Nigel Farage appeared to endorse his new MP’s position on his Wednesday evening GB News show. “I don’t think face coverings in public places make sense and I think we do deserve a debate”, he declared.
Tice, Reform’s deputy leader, echoed this stance across a series of broadcast interviews on Thursday morning.
Then Yusuf chimed in. Blamed for the spokesperson’s intervention, he insisted the statement had “nothing to do with me”. But Yusuf, who is of Muslim heritage, added: “I do think it’s dumb for a party to ask the PM if they would do something the party itself wouldn’t do.”
The Reform chairman resigned at 5.25 pm on Thursday.
The saga is revealing on several counts. First, as a process of making and unveiling policy, Pochin’s PMQs stunt was obviously misguided. Tice seemed aware of its substance ahead of time, telling his X followers on Wednesday morning to prepare for an “interesting question for the prime minister”. But the party machinery was taken aback; it speaks to a political naivety on the part of all involved.
The substance of the policy — that of a nationwide ban on the burqa — is significant too. A first appearance at prime minister’s questions, such as Pochin’s on Wednesday, is an immediate opportunity to signal one’s values and priorities. This is especially the case for a new Reform MP (one of five), who the media have been watching closely since her by-election victory in Runcorn and Helsby.
This is now Pochin’s brand. She is the MP who, upon first catching the speaker’s eye at PMQs, chose to ask the prime minister about the prospect of banning a religious garment.
Electorally, such culturalist issues are a dead end — especially for a party that operates to the right of the mainstream parties, and is therefore exposed to allegations of “extreme” or “fringe” politics.
Farage, it should be said, understands public opinion far better than his critics allege.
He has occupied the frontline of politics, in one guise or another, for considerably longer than any of his contemporaries across multiple eras. He recognises that Reform, to succeed, must adopt positions that expand its appeal and affirm its position as a politically palatable alternative to the mainstream parties. As such, the Reform leader has tracked to the left on some issues; he has brought his public stance on the Ukraine war more in line with public opinion; he has stopped referencing his relationship with Donald Trump; he has said he no longer considers himself a “populist”; and, according to reports, he is instinctively opposed to Liz Truss joining the party.
The appointment of Yusuf, a 38-year-old man whose parents came to the UK as immigrants, as Reform chair could also be considered in these terms.
This saga then, risks inflicting very real reputational damage on the party at a crucial stage. At least, it sends the wrong signal to the non-ideological but disillusioned voters Farage must court this parliament to succeed.
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Incoherent chaos
Yusuf’s resignation is, rightly, being considered alongside the suspension of Rupert Lowe, the onetime Reform MP for Great Yarmouth.
Lowe represents this culturalist right brand of politics that Farage has been hesitant to embrace since the general election. Since rising to prominence on X, where his posts regularly go viral, the now-independent MP has descended a rabbit hole that Farage has consciously avoided.
His suspension, whatever the disputed details, spoke to Farage’s desire to heave Reform further away from the unelectable fringe and towards the mainstream of public opinion.
It is instructive that Yusuf’s departure is being celebrated by those same online voices who still bitterly regret Lowe’s suspension. In other words: for the first time this parliament, Reform’s noisy fringe has secured a win at the expense of the party leadership.
That is significant. It is a signal that Reform is not making the transition from challenger party to possible party of government as smoothly as its spokespeople, and the polls, relay.
In this regard, there is an ideological incoherence to Reform’s rows; the party risks being suspended in political limbo, caught between the diametric pulls of the mainstream and fringe. This ambiguity will manifest in more salient ways, and at increasingly problematic moments in the electoral cycle, if Farage does not reestablish some sense of coherence. A question hangs over whether he has the authority and will to do so.
Reform’s mistakes are explicable: a party caught in transition, operating across a political landscape that is radically reconstituting, fronted by leaders that are, at least, not used to being at the front of the pack is bound to err. The stakes of this game are far higher than any Farage has participated in across a career spanning decades.
He is presenting as a potential prime minister; this posture, necessarily, invites a level of scrutiny that Farage is not used to. His mistakes are no longer mere curiosities that are swallowed by his larger mythos. They are interpreted as insights into the potential operation of a Reform government.
Farage will recognise that every statement by Reform, and the guise in which it is delivered, serves as a credibility test. Even those who are flocking to Reform in “mid-term” elections must be convinced of the party’s credentials as a prospective government.
Voters are familiar with chaos, drama and infighting — having witnessed and endorsed the downfall of the last Conservative government. A vibe of disunity, even if the public do not recognise the specifics of recent rows, could prove sticky — just as Farage is seeking to establish a slick, professional Reform brand.
Nigel Farage’s third man problem
In Westminster, Nigel Farage has a reputation for being a poor delegator. His career path is lined with the political headstones of rivals, both realised and prospective.
However, Farage is a ruthless guard of his position not (only) on account of his ego — but because of his paranoia. He does not trust many of the individuals who support his party to carry the flame forward. He watched on as Ukip degenerated into a Tommy Robinson fan club across the 2018-2019 period, despite the obvious electoral opportunity for a right-wing challenger party. He is a canny politician who is concerned with the homogeneity of his operation. And when he does trust individuals, he delegates significantly; Tice and Yusuf are both recent examples.
Farage, in short, is frit.
He is battling against precedent and all reasonable assessments of how populist outfits like Reform evolve and devolve. If the Senedd and Holyrood elections in 2026 go as well for the party as is expected, Reform will be suddenly flushed with new “talent”. Who those individuals are, and how they conduct themselves in office, are under-considered factors that will shape Reform’s development.
The new recruits will almost certainly create challenges for Farage to overcome. Some, we can reasonably predict, will be captured by their social media algorithms, take on the trajectory of Lowe, and advise Farage to follow. (A challenger party to the right of Reform could be significant in that regard).
Indeed, one of Farage’s historic challenges is that there have always been more Lowes available to him than Yusufs: more uncompromising ideologues than competent managers. That, in short, is why Farage is so taken by the prospect of Tory defections, at local, regional and national levels. By Reform’s standards, they will be reasonable (and crucially pre-vetted) individuals.
I am convinced that Reform’s biggest credibility test concerns its personnel. If Farage is to truly commit to the future prime minister bit — and while he refuses to countenance any Reform-Tory pact — he will need to give a sense of what a government in his name will look like. He cannot appoint Richard Tice, his trusty deputy, to every open post.
On top of this, Farage isn’t getting any younger; arguably, the best interests of his party at this juncture would be served by some form of succession planning. In our current political climate, the existence of identifiable heir apparents is a necessary, if implicit, component of a party’s appeal.
To appear credible as a prospective government then, Farage will need to open up Reform for scrutiny. That is the immense challenge that awaits the party.
In Yusuf, Farage had appeared to establish a model for what a high-level Reform operator could look like: a third man after himself and Tice.
In Yusuf’s exit and the surrounding drama, we see how Reform could come unstuck.
Josh Self is Editor of Politics.co.uk, follow him on Bluesky here.
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