Reform candidate in Clacton posted “transparent antisemitism”

There are 28 seats where the UK’s Reform Party is polling above 20 per cent and may threaten Tory hopes. One of them is Clacton, the Essex constituency where Nigel Farage, the party’s honorary chair, has so far declined to stand as an MP.

The Reform candidate is Tony Mack, a psychotherapist and former black cab driver whose campaign literature has promised to fix “woke ideology” and “discrimination against the people of Britain in favour of foreign arrivals or minorities”. In December, Mack posted on Twitter that Muslims were “backward, maladjusted and taught hate through Islam”.

More recently he wrote that “secular or moderate Muslim is an oxymoron”. A Reform spokesperson told Tortoise Mack’s comments about Muslims were “strong” and that the party was looking into the candidate. 

Mack has also shared images of a well-known mural featuring antisemitic tropes. The mural depicts hook-nosed financiers counting money and playing a Monopoly-style board game on the backs of naked figures. The images of the mural shared by Mack were captioned: “If the people stand, the game is over.” When Mack posted the image on Twitter, he added the words: “Get up, stand up.” He also shared the image on Tiktok, writing that Reform was the only way to save Britain from the “globalist agenda”, a phrase often used as an antisemitic dog whistle.

The mural, called “Freedom for Humanity”, may be familiar to those who follow British politics. In 2018, then-Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn apologised for questioning its removal from a wall in East London, saying its contents were deeply disturbing and antisemitic. 

The Reform spokesperson said that it was clear that Mack was talking about “the ability of the little man to do something about his lot”.

Danny Stone, CEO of Antisemitism Policy Trust, a charity which educates and empowers MPs to address antisemitism, said the image posted by Mack was “transparent antisemitism”. 

Stone said a simple Google search would have made it immediately clear that the picture had been “roundly condemned and should not be shared”. At the time of writing, Mack was still listed as the candidate for Clacton. He didn’t respond to a request for comment.