Two former Tories who defected to Reform this year are facing questions after it emerged the suspect in the Belfast attack entered the UK while they were in charge of immigration.
Hadi Alodid claims to have come into the country via the Common Travel Area between Ireland and Northern Ireland in 2023.
According to the Home Office, the 30-year-old Sudanese national was granted refugee status the same year and has leave to remain in the UK until 2028.
Suella Braverman was Home Secretary under Prime Minister Rishi Sunak between October 2022 and November 2023, while Robert Jenrick served as immigration minister for roughly the same period.
Braverman and Jenrick both defected to Reform UK in January, and both now sit as MPs for Nigel Farage’s party.
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Both also have roles as party spokespeople for specific policy areas, with Jenrick particularly prominent as Treasury spokesman.
Speaking to GB News yesterday evening, Braverman claimed she was powerless to put changes in place despite being in control of the British immigration system at the time.
She said: ‘As Home Secretary I repeatedly argued to the Prime Minister and the Cabinet that we needed to leave the ECHR to stop the invasion.
‘For this, I was attacked, blocked and undermined by my own Conservative colleagues who have consistently refused to apologise for the failures of the last government.
‘The failure to stop the boats and leave the ECHR remains the Greatest Betrayal by the last Conservative government and it is why over 90% of asylum claims are approved.
‘It is the main reason I left that dysfunctional and treacherous party and why the Conservative Party can never be trusted again.’
Jenrick is yet to respond, but wrote on Facebook yesterday that Reform would ban visas for anyone coming to the UK from Sudan.
He said: ‘The only reason to have immigration is if it makes British people safer and richer. Clearly migration from Sudan is doing the opposite.’
A post on his X account this morning addressing the ‘truly barbaric footage’ from Belfast was given a community note drawing attention to his past in the Conservative government.
It reads: ‘In 2023, Suella Braverman (Home Secretary) and Robert Jenrick (Immigration Minister) gave the alleged attacker leave to remain and refugee status.’
Critics including Rupert Lowe, the former Reform MP who now leads hard-right party Restore Britain, have drawn hundreds of thousands of views on X posts drawing attention to the pair’s links.
Reform UK has been approached for comment.
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