NIGEL Farage has said he will make a statement about his “future in public life” amid growing pressure after it was revealed he took financial support from a convicted criminal.
The Reform UK leader will speak on Tuesday afternoon at 2pm as he is engulfed in controversy after it was revealed fraudster George Cottrell paid for his staff before the General Election.
In previous public addresses, Farage has used the livestream feature on Twitter/X and may do so in this instance.
He is facing intense scrutiny over financial support he took from Cottrell, an aristocratic entrepreneur and former gambling addict who spent eight months in US prisons in 2017 after advising undercover agents posing as drug dealers on how to launder money.
In total, Farage is facing the prospect of four separate parliamentary sleaze probes, with the standards watchdog also looking into his failure to declare a £5 million gift from the British-Thai crypto mogul Christopher Harborne before the last General Election.
Separately, he has been reported to the parliamentary standards watchdog over claims he inappropriately lobbied Andrew Bailey, the Governor of the Bank of England, to drop plans for a state-backed cryptocurrency initiative.
He has also been referred for investigation over claims he failed to properly set out the size of his £4m property portfolio.
Farage has denied wrongdoing.
It was not immediately clear what the Reform UK leader would announce in his statement on Tuesday afternoon, however it will fuel speculation that he could be feeling the heat as he faced the most intense scrutiny of his political career to date.
Footage of Farage confronting a Sky News reporter who attempted to quiz him about the donations went viral after the MP lashed out at the journalist.
A fuming Farage told the reporter: "You tell your bosses, you harass my family anymore, there will be serious consequences.
“That’s what your organisation has done this morning, go away.”
The Reform leader then stormed off, but the reporter asked again: “Was it a mistake not to declare the gifts, sir?”
Farage then walked back to the Sky News journalist and snapped: "Did you not hear me? You have broken all the rules, Leveson and everything else. Cut.”
Sky said it had not contacted anyone from Farage’s family about the story.
He is expected to be interviewed by Daniel Greenberg, the parliamentary commissioner for standards, within the next fortnight over the £5m gift from Harborne, The Times reports.
Parliamentary rules require new MPs to register any gifts worth more than £300 that they received in the previous 12 months, except where the gift “could not be reasonably thought by others” to relate to their political activities.
Farage previously claimed that he did not need to report the gift because it was to fund his security but later said it was "not the public's business" what he did with the money, adding: "I can spend it on cars if I want to."
Elsewhere, Reform figures claimed that the support from Cottrell, which included giving Farage the use of a house he rented near Buckingham Palace, was help from "a friend" and that nothing improper had occurred.
