Zia Yusuf, the ‘British Muslim patriot’ Nigel Farage trusts with the border
Britain is on a “catastrophic” path headed for “sectarian violence,” says the entrepreneur tasked with selling Reform UK’s hardline migration policies — and talking up Christianity.
By SAM BLEWETT
in London
Zia Yusuf and Nigel Farage stand onstage following the Reform UK deportations policy announcement in Oxford, England on Aug. 26, 2025. | Leon Neal/Getty Images
The first time I meet Zia Yusuf we’re in a seafront hotel near the White Cliffs of Dover, the backdrop for so many of Britain’s hopes and fears about immigration.
It is early in Ramadan and Yusuf is fasting. He’s here to give his first major speech as Nigel Farage’s pick for home secretary if the insurgent Reform UK enters government — and the big new policy he’s unveiling centers on concerns Islam is displacing Christianity.
Yusuf has been a key player in professionalizing Farage’s right-wing movement, transforming Reform from a populist “start-up” into a more disciplined political machine. As a tech millionaire son of Sri Lankan immigrants, he occupies a powerful — and fairly unique — position: a self-described “proud British Muslim patriot” who uses his own success story to help sell a platform of mass deportations and shielding Christianity.
With Reform fighting to oust Labour and run Britain, Farage has picked Yusuf as the party’s most strident messenger on an issue that roils the country’s politics like few others.
The pugnacious 39-year-old tech millionaire delivers his Dover assault on migration in the gravest of terms to a room of Reform enthusiasts, hitting out at the “invasion” of people who have arrived in the U.K. without permission on small boats.
Yusuf doubles down on his pledge to embark on an unprecedented mass deportation program and rip Britain out of its international human rights treaties. But he also vows to take on the “real and growing threat of Islamist extremism” and announces a new policy of preventing the “incendiary” act of converting churches into mosques.
The policy, unveiled on a dreary day in February, feels a curious one. There’s little to suggest these changes are happening in any large numbers — indeed, the Church of England places covenants on buildings they sell so they cannot be made into sites of other worship. Yet Yusuf insists he gets frequent correspondence about what he says is an issue of real import, adding: “I can send you a list of 41 straight away.” Even if that number checks out, it would represent a minuscule fraction of extant churches in the U.K.
But Yusuf’s focus on religion is part of an increasing trend on the right of British politics, from its extremes to the mainstream. Reform and their establishment rivals in the Conservatives have been speaking more about Britain’s Christian roots, as they stoke concern about a civilizational threat posed by Islam.
Yusuf says if Britain stays on its current trajectory “we’re headed to sectarian violence in this country.”
“We’re headed for not just a bad outcome, but a catastrophic one, where everybody’s now divided amongst racial or religious lines, voting accordingly, the economy is not growing, the most productive people are leaving,” he warns. Labour charge that Yusuf’s plans are “about ripping apart families and communities and attacking our friends and neighbors.”
Party rifts
For all the dark warnings, Yusuf explains that his ambition is to re-inspire the generosity that’s foundational to his family story, in which his parents arrived in Britain from Sri Lanka.
Born Muhammad Ziauddin Yusuf to two National Health Service workers in North Lanarkshire in 1986, his talents won him a 50 percent scholarship to the elite fee-paying Hampton School in south-west London. He graduated from the London School of Economics, before working in banking and then co-founding a luxury concierge start-up that would be sold for around $300 million.
Yusuf speaks warmly about the welcome his family received. But he argues the same welcoming nature that propelled his family to success is now being taken for granted by asylum seekers living on welfare in tax-payer funded accommodation, while the very fabric of Britain is torn apart by high levels of legal migration.
“I don’t know there are many countries in the world where my story would be possible, and so I take that very seriously, and I will not allow the goodwill and generosity of the British people to be taken advantage of,” Yusuf, characteristically dressed in a sharp blue suit with a Union Jack pin on his lapel, tells me in Dover. “So actually, the notion that our policies create division is a nonsense — we’re the ones who are trying to stop the division.”
Indeed, there are some in the party who see his own status as a second-generation immigrant as a benefit when trying to drive what one Reform official describes as an “incredibly radical” approach towards migration. “It helps he’s from an immigrant background so it’s hard to throw stones at him,” says the official, who like others in this piece was granted anonymity to speak about internal party matters.
But stones are thrown — and not always by rival parties. Despite his crucial role in shaping Reform into an election-fighting machine that the polls suggest could propel Farage into Downing Street, it’s not always been smooth. Yusuf resigned as party chairman with a post on X after new Reform MP Sarah Pochin spoke in favor of banning the burqa — a demand he branded “dumb.” Farage blamed Yusuf’s exit on the “tirade of personal racist abuse” he received online. “Look, it obviously is difficult, but I take full responsibility for my decisions,” he says when I ask him about the circumstances around his brief, high-profile fallout with Reform last June.
A self-confessed workaholic who carries out his Reform duties for free, Yusuf now blames his resignation on a “decision borne out of exhaustion” — and says he has come to support banning all face coverings under a law-and-order argument.
‘Would we ban praying in public?’
When we meet again in March, religion is in the air once more — with a debate over Muslim prayer raging on the right of British politics.
Our second meeting is in the Michelin-starred restaurant of the Goring Hotel in central London (Yusuf’s choice). With its chintzy decor and finely-dressed staff, the Goring is a special occasion kind of place, unless you’re the late Queen Mother — or Zia Yusuf. I ask if he’s been here before, and our waitress answers for him: “Many times, I believe.”
Ramadan is over and it’s Eid al-Fitr, a time to celebrate the end of the fast. Just a day before, Pochin made more unscripted remarks that are causing controversy. When her autocue froze during a speech in Scotland she claimed aides had to stop her from appearing on stage in a tartan burqa. Yusuf shrugs it off as “a joke” from someone he now describes as a friend — but there is a more serious debate involving Islam in Britain that he declines to deflect.
Senior Conservative MP Nick Timothy described a large group of Muslim worshippers praying in Trafalgar Square as an “act of domination,” that is “straight from the Islamist playbook.”
Both Christians and Jews came to the defense of the “open Iftar” in which people of all faiths and none were invited to break the fast. But Yusuf’s boss Farage joined Conservative Leader Kemi Badenoch in calling for such mass Muslim prayers to be banned.
Yusuf is much more hesitant. He says he understands the controversy, even arguing that the prayer in question met the dictionary definition of “incendiary” because of the row that ensued. He would’ve advised a different site for the open prayer.
If Reform wins, he says, “I would like my legacy to be a way of creating a cohesion amongst a country which does have a lot of Muslims in it, obviously, right, does have a lot of Hindus in it, does have a lot of Sikhs, obviously does have a lot of Christians. And my view on how that’s delivered is through a sense of preference for Christianity, to be honest about that.”
That reminds me to jog his memory for detail on the 41 under-threat churches I’m yet to receive — having pestered the party too. “Oh, I’ll send it to you,” Yusuf responds.
But would he as home secretary ban mass prayer? Yusuf stresses that freedom to practice religion is an essential part of Britishness, and warns of unintended consequences from legislating on the issue.
“Would we ban praying in public? No, we wouldn’t ban that,” he says, then points to complexities around size limits when pressed on whether that means mass gatherings.
Yusuf says Reform is examining if there is a “policy response that is helpful,” but again warns of unintended consequences: “And so even if you did say, right, we’re banning all prayer in public — which is not what we want to do, and I think would be a bad idea, and not a British thing to do — then you’re somewhat getting away from a really important discussion that needs to be had here.”
From start-up to party
Policy matters aside, Yusuf is helping to shift Reform from a “start-up,” in his own words, to a professional party. It won hundreds of councillors in last year’s local elections, took control of 10 local authorities, and will seriously challenge to win the next general election, due in 2029, if it sustains its current popularity in opinion polls. The former Goldman Sachs executive has been an essential counter to Farage’s free-wheeling campaign gusto — even if Yusuf has in the past week had to reckon again with the party’s struggle to root out candidates responsible for, in his words, “abhorrent” conduct.
Much has changed since Yusuf joined the party’s top brass in July 2024 after donating £200,000 to Farage’s election campaign — not least a string of high-profile defectors from the Conservatives including Robert Jenrick and Suella Braverman, who Yusuf once described as “the most insidious form of politician.” Both were, after all, in government when post-Brexit Britain experienced record high levels of immigration. Now all involved are at pains to stress unity.
A second Reform official acknowledged Yusuf’s influence has waned as the party has grown. Jenrick was recently gifted the shadow Treasury job he coveted.
“For a while Zia thought he and Nigel could run the country,” they said. “The bigger you become as an organization the less power you hold.” Yusuf in an interview in early 2025 described speaking to Farage “50 times a day.” Now he tells POLITICO their chats happen “pretty much every day.”
The second official said of Yusuf: “Zia has a habit of attacking people who are joining us. He attacked Suella and Jenrick — he called them traitors. He attacks people who might come our way because it dissipates his power.”
The first Reform official said Yusuf remains “crucial to everything Reform do” but stressed his importance “particularly early on.” They heaped praise on Yusuf’s work ethic, which they argued is fueled by a loathing of mainstream politicians. “He genuinely hates the political establishment and probably hates the Tory party more than he hates the Labour party,” the adviser said.
Yusuf routinely calls out “betrayal” by the Conservatives, attacking a legacy of high taxation and high immigration despite promises otherwise. “As somebody who has voted Tory in my adult life, I found that betrayal just spectacular,” he tells me at the Goring, over Acquerello risotto, pan-fried bass and courgette flower that goes half-eaten. The truffle potato puree he orders is cleared away untouched.
Then along came Farage’s return the political scene, a comeback for the man Yusuf describes as the “ultimate political founder.” Yusuf still talks in the idiom of Silicon Valley, reeling off stats at every opportunity. He wants to become an MP at some point, though where he’s not decided. “I’ve got plenty on my plate at the moment,” he said.
Yusuf’s past political leanings are complex too. He has described himself as being “center left” in his university days and “more left” still before that. He speaks with pride about having joined the vast marches against the invasion of Iraq, and of celebrating Barack Obama’s election as U.S. president.
Yusuf plays down his former leftie credentials when we speak at the Goring. “I wouldn’t say left wing,” he says. “I mean, I’ve only ever voted Conservative in my life prior to, obviously, Reform being around.” He attributes his shift rightwards to starting to earn money in the City of London and setting up his Velocity Black business — prompting him to think more about the sanctity of taxpayers’ money.
Some who’ve met Yusuf describe him as having a crushing chip on his shoulder, and they struggle to get a sense of a hinterland. “He’s an enigma,” said one person who worked with him in Reform.
Attempts to pin Yusuf down on even the vaguest of personal matters is tricky. He tells me he’ll be off to see his family later to celebrate Eid. But what else is he up to this weekend? He’ll play some tennis and go to the gym, he says, before snapping back to plans for “crunching a load of numbers” because of pending policy announcements.
That work ethic is challenging for some, particularly subordinates.
The BBC has documented how staff both within Reform and at Velocity Black found his behavior controlling and sometimes domineering. During Yusuf’s short-lived resignation, Arron Banks, a close ally of Farage throughout the Brexit campaign and beyond, said: “The corks will be popping in party HQ this evening.”
“I have high standards,” Yusuf acknowledges.
‘Move fast’
So how will Yusuf handle government, should Reform make it that far? “I wouldn’t say move fast and break things. But it is move fast.”
When Reform won their first local authorities, Yusuf headed up an Elon Musk-inspired “DOGE” unit to slash spending. Nowhere was more important to the project than Reform’s flagship Kent County Council (KCC). But finding budget cuts wasn’t easy.
Bill Barrett, who was kicked out of Reform after a video leak displayed just how divided the Kent cabinet was, described Yusuf’s approach there as “smash and grab chaos.”
He recounts how Yusuf would arrive at the local authority in England’s south east and demand “15 filing cabinets” of documents to take back to London for analysis when he wasn’t happy with how the expenditure cull was going. “To which the officers at KCC said not a chance in hell because that’s GDPR (data protection laws) and you’re not even elected mate, so basically piss off,” Barrett, who has made the rare conversion from Reform to the Tories, says.
“Then he came back a second time and had a proper go at everyone … saying we’re not finding savings, we’re not happy,” Barrett adds. “Basically he’s a very, very pushy individual who’s obviously experienced high-level corporate life.” Voters will in time judge the impact of the claimed millions in savings — but more immediately they’re facing council tax hikes of a high 4 percent.
Yusuf foresees great challenges to his policy platform if Farage does ever take Downing Street. He cites POLITICO’s reporting that some in a civil service that’s meant to impartially enact the government’s program would struggle to “stomach” working under Reform, particularly in the Home Office.
“Nigel’s not in any doubt that if I go into the Home Office as home secretary and there’re staff there who are going to start sabotaging what we’re doing or unwilling to get with the program or unwilling to embark on a mass deportation program they won’t be in the Home Office for very long,” Yusuf warns.
The threats he foresees to the project do not stop there. “My baseline assumption is that every unelected body, if we win the general election and a majority, every unelected body in the country will be hostile to us,” he says — before training his sights on the House of Lords.
“We’re not gonna get into any wars of our own choice but we have to be prepared,” he says of the upper chamber. He argues that peers put in place “by Tony Blair, by Gordon Brown” are and “generally not going to be in favor of most of things. I think most of them would recoil at the idea of detaining and deporting people who are in this country illegally. Should that be the case, then packing the Lords is on the table as an option.”
That means finding and appointing hundreds and hundreds of peers, I say. “Yep. I think we would have every right to do that so long as we have been very honest with the British people about what we’re planning on doing,” he replies. “And if we’ve won a mandate from the electorate, how dare any peer stand in the way and try and stop at us delivering for the British people?”
But wouldn’t that involve appointing 900 or so new Reform peers to get a majority from a baseline of zero, I ask? Yusuf seems up for the fight. “It’d be a lot. We’re working on recruiting those people as we speak.”
Radical pitch
There’s no doubt Yusuf’s policy platform is radical. There’s the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement-style removals force to assist in deporting 600,000 people over five years.
Then there’s scrapping Britain’s permanent settled status for migrants, a move that could see people who have legally lived and worked in the U.K. for years deported. There’s paying countries like Afghanistan to take back migrants. And there’s forcibly removing women and children asylum seekers who arrive illegally. “Nobody’s out of scope,” he says, though he concedes there will be an element of prioritization.
Then there would be pulling Britain out of the European Convention on Human Rights and other treaties Yusuf believes are a hindrance; making the maritime border “among the most surveilled in the world”; and a vast expansion of police “stop and search” powers.
First Farage cheered on Brexit, a decisive split that has left much of the public dissatisfied and was only followed by a spike in migration. Now Yusuf taking the country out of the ECHR is being offered as an antidote.
The Reform rep’s critics would pitch the plan as an easy sell that belies the true nature of the problem. More than a month after Yusuf first promised POLITICO the church list, it’s yet to materialize.
