If MPs can profit from outrage on X, democracy does not stand a chance, writes Natasha Devon

Analysis by political expert group Cast from Clay analysed 1.5 million mentions of political parties across broadcast media channels between 1st January and 3 September 2025. They found a stark disparity, with Reform UK emerging as the most talked-about party with 924,693 mentions and the Liberal Democrats (described as ‘under represented’) at the other end of the scale with only 46,446. This means that the Lib Dems are discussed one-twentieth as much as Reform, despite being the third-most-represented party in parliament with 77 MPs (compared to Reform’s 4).

It’s a shame, too, because the Lib Dems seem to be the only party at the moment who are as concerned as we all should be about the malign influence of Trumpian politics on the UK. Despite various US commentators writing open letters to the British population warning of the consequences of falling for this kind of populism, there’s an apparent reluctance, by English politicians in particular, to explicitly call it out.

One can only assume this is because the Conservatives and Reform support the current US administration, whilst the party of government are too terrified of potential ramifications in the form of one of Trump’s notorious temper tantrums.

Just like in the US, X (formerly known as Twitter) is the crucible in which the talking points which are slowly radicalising the nation are formed. Since Musk’s takeover, the previously-banned accounts of racist hate-mongers have been reinstated in the name of ‘free speech’.

Analysis has also found that X’s algorithm favours extreme right-wing content, pushing it into feeds regardless of the political affiliations or interests of those on the receiving end. Perhaps most worrying of all, X allows its users to monetise content based on the number of views, which means the platform actively incentivises engagement farming around far-right talking points.

Perhaps it’s no surprise, then, that many of the accounts on X posing as MAGA ‘patriots’ have been found to be operated from Russia, Nigeria, Bangladesh, India and Eastern Europe. In countries with enormous wealth disparity in their populations, posting hate speech is a way of making a quick buck. The net result is a dangerous impression of consensus.

More concerningly, our own politicians are at it as well. Rupert Lowe, leader of hard-right party Restore UK, reportedly makes around £40,000 from his posts on X. Reform MPs Nigel Farage and Lee Anderson, as well as deputy leader of the party Richard Tice, have all also declared thousands of pounds in income from the site.

Again, the Lib Dems seem to be the only party troubled by this. They are pushing for a ban on MPs accepting payments from X as part of a proposed wider crackdown on what Ed Davey has called a “serious threat” to UK democracy. He’s right, of course. The attention economy demands content creators produce incrementally more outrageous and extreme output to gain traction.

In doing so, they normalise views which would have been considered shocking ten years ago, like so-called ‘remigration’ (the removal of people of certain heritage or faith background from a population – otherwise known as ethnic cleansing). This is not a game politicians should be playing.

Politicians' words have a tangible impact – the number of reported hate crimes targeting Muslims rose from 8 the week prior to 38 the week following Boris Johnson wrote an op-ed comparing women who wear the burqa to letter boxes, for example. MPs have a responsibility to inject sense and thoughtfulness into the public discourse, not to inflame it. Perhaps they would be more inclined to do so if the latter couldn’t inflate their personal wealth.

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Listen to LBC's Natasha Devon on Saturdays from 6-9pm on the LBC app.

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