by Ralph Keller
Donald Trump made his second visit to the UK as President between 16 and 18 September 2025. In response, the Stop Trump Coalition, a group of more than 50 unions and charities, marched through the city of London towards Whitehall. According to police estimates, about 5,000 people attended the march.
Protesters mocking baby Trump. Credit: BBC News.
Signs at the 17 September protest read “Stop Trump, Stop Fascism”, “Orange Lies Matter”, or “No To Trump, No To Racism”, expressing disgust not only with Trump, but also with the UK government for bowing down to him and to racism. Indeed, a spokesperson for the Stop Trump coalition said: “A government that will bow down to Trump and to racism is one that will open the door to fascism.”
Further, protestors said they demonstrate to “defeat the politics of Trumpism” and to promote “an alternative, democratic vision of the world based on peace, social justice and international cooperation”. A protestor also explained, “[w]e want our government to show some backbone, and have a little bit of pride and represent that huge feeling of disgust at Donald Trump’s politics in the UK”.
In a grand display of bowing down to Trump and racism, the UK government burned millions of taxpayer Pounds not only to roll out the red carpet, but to also kick it up a notch through “pomp and pageantry”. This meant throwing an all-out military parade, letting him ride in the Royal Carriage, and throwing a lavish dinner while the women wore funny hats.
In addition to marching, protesters also projected a video about the Epstein scandal onto the walls of Windsor Castle, where Trump was staying. The closing words in the video read:
The President of the United States was a long-time close friend of America’s most notorious child sex trafficker. He’s alleged to be mentioned numerous times in the files arising from the investigation into that child sex trafficker. And now [that] he is back in office, the US federal government appears to be doing all it can to prevent the American public from learning fully about the President’s relationship with the country’s most notorious child sex trafficker. Now that President, Donald Trump, is sleeping here in Windsor Castle.
These words surely sting, especially the final sentence, as it links the Royal Family with Trump, a key figure in the Epstein scandal. And the words did sting indeed, as four men were arrested “on suspicion of a number of offences, including malicious communications and public nuisance”, but were later released on bail.
The video and the march did not stop Nigel Farage, the UK’s very own Trump, from unveiling his plan to reform the immigration system. The Guardian newspaper, print edition of 23 September 2025, reported that, starting 2026, Farage intends to stop a total of 800,000 people from becoming eligible for Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR). In addition, this Guardian article reports that “Nigel Farage wants you to believe that Britain could deport 288,000 people annually. That’s nearly 800 a day.”
ILR is a fancy term in UK immigration law, whereby “Leave to Remain” means that a person can leave the country, and can later re-enter without a visa, i.e., can remain in the UK (if certain conditions are met, as is always the case with capitalist liberties). This right is granted indefinitely.
Farage’s plan is blatantly racist and nationalist because it would not apply to EU migrants who were already living in the UK before 30 June 2021, the date when the transition period after leaving the EU ended. But why does Farage want to abolish ILR for non-EU migrants? To understand this, let’s look at the conditions according to which a person is not allowed to receive government funds, as set out on the Government’s website, gov.uk:
- you’re residing in the UK as a European Economic Area (EEA) jobseeker
- you’re an asylum seeker or sponsored to be in the UK
- you’re subject to immigration control and your granted leave states that you cannot claim public funds
The final point, “your granted leave states that you cannot claim public funds”, is key. To the best of my knowledge, it is normally the case that people holding ILR do have access to public funds. That’s because ILR will usually be granted after 5 years of working in the UK, at which point a person is no longer restricted from claiming public funds. This explains why Farage intends to abolish ILR: he wants to limit the amount of migrants who can claim public funds.
But what was the reaction? Mostly, and disappointingly, the pushback was limited to challenging the numbers that Farage used to make his claims as well as questioning the workability of his proposal. Pushback on moral grounds was limited to pointing out that the plan would rip families apart, and there was, shockingly, little in the way of calling it what it is: blatantly racist and white supremacist. At least The Guardian called Farage out, arguing his fantasy figure of deporting 800 people a day conceals
his real aim: to destroy public trust in democratic institutions, crush legal constraints and turn fear into power. Mr Farage isn’t trying to fix the asylum system. In fact, he wants to dismantle the political framework necessary to achieve that goal: the treaties, parliamentary conventions and centuries of legal protections. In their place, a Reform [UK] government would operate by executive fiat cloaked in nationalist rhetoric.
To make Farage’s fantasy come true, Reform UK, which Farage heads, intends to withdraw the UK from the European Convention on Human Rights, leaving a far-right government accountable to no-one. But this is what the protesters were fighting on 17 September: Farage adopting the MAGA playbook for the UK. In other words, the London protest was an expression of the urgent truth that we must stop the far right from succeeding, not only in the US and the UK, but also globally.
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