The admission of potential chaos follows a string of hardline policy announcements from the party
Nigel Farage has predicted there will be strikes, protests and riots if Reform UK makes it into Number 10.
He compared a potential Reform government to Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan and Donald Trump – claiming that Britain would become “a third-world country” if Reform did not win and deliver change.
Speaking on American podcast, The Benny Show, Mr Farage said: “As soon as we try and make a difference, there’ll be strikes, there’ll be protests, there’ll be riots, there’ll be abuse, there’ll be physical threats.”
The admission of chaos if Reform wins power in the UK follows a string of hardline policy announcements from the party and comes against the backdrop of protests around ICE operations in several states in America, during which a number of protesters were killed.
Reform prompted outrage this week after Robert Jenrick suggested that Royal Marines could fire on illegal migrants in the Channel, although the party later rowed back on the threat.
But a series of radical measures on migration – including ending asylum for five years and mass deportations – could spark widespread protests. Added to that, Reform UK have threatened to cut government spending by £100bn in the first 100 days of a government in a move which could see job losses and welfare slashed, fuelling discontent.
Mr Farage has also pledged to bring Donald Trump’s controversial ICE adviser, Tom Homan, to Britain “to secure our borders” in a bid to have mass deportations. Homan helped design Mr Trump’s first-term family-separation policy and is now central to the administration’s immigration crackdown.
Already voters are turning against Reform with their support dropping 12 points in the last year, according to a More in Common poll on Wednesday which put them on 21 per cent.
Mr Farage made the comments to Benny Johnson, a Trump-aligned US media personality and supporter of ICE, on the same podcast where he suggested he might hand over the Chagos Islands to the US.
Mr Johnson is being sued for defamation by two Illinois residents after he described them as “left-wing terrorists” during protests outside an ICE detention centre.
The claimants say they were peacefully protesting, were released without charge and that Johnson’s allegations were false. No finding of liability has been made.
It comes as leading historian Lord Peter Hennessy told the Speaker’s Corner podcast a Reform government could “rip up the constitution, and the way we recruit and promote our senior civil servants, and indeed would interfere in the choice of judges, I fear.”
He added that “so much would go in one” and “we’d crumble, and it would be very hard to get it back.”
He also appeared to hit out at Boris Johnson as he one of his “greatest shocks” was seeing “just how vulnerable we were when we had a prime minister in No 10 who either didn’t know about the niceties of the British constitution, the careful balances, or couldn’t give a fig for them, and disdained what we were there for.”
Akiko Hart, director at Liberty, said: “The UK’s constitution is vulnerable because it relies on convention. We can’t rely on good faith and informal agreements when our democracy and the rule of law could be put at risk.
“If we want to protect the rights and freedoms we all value, then it is critical that the government puts safeguards in place that provide checks and balances against overreach, including defending judicial review.
“A more resilient constitution will help safeguard the democratic freedoms we all enjoy now and futureproof the rights of generations to come – regardless of who is in government.”
Reform UK have been approached for comment.
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies