Raheem Kassam

Early life and education

Kassam was born in Hammersmith Hospital, Acton, London, the son of Tanzanian immigrant parents of Gujarati origin from Hillingdon, Greater London. He was raised in the liberal Ismaili sect of Shia Islam, but wrote in 2016 that he had not been a practising Muslim for over a decade.

Kassam is an atheist, stating that Christopher Hitchens' rejection of religious faith ("religions are versions of the same untruth") inspired him. Kassam was educated at Bishopshalt School, a state comprehensive school in Uxbridge and St Helen's College, Hillingdon, and then studied Politics at the University of Westminster.

Life and career

Kassam was a national executive board member of Conservative Future and director of campus anti-extremism group Student Rights, and campaigned against the London School of Economics for accepting money from Gaddafi's Libya, the university's director Howard Davies would later resign when new revelations revealed the extent of the institutions relationship with the Gaddafi regime. In a 2011 interview, Kassam named his idols as Michael Gove, Margaret Thatcher and Barry Goldwater, and spoke of his admiration for the United States' free markets. He attended the University of Westminster at the same time as the ISIS executioner known as "Jihadi John", and has called his alma mater a "hot bed" of fundamentalism.

Kassam has worked for Lehman Brothers, managed electoral campaigns in the UK and United States and was Executive Editor of The Commentator, but left the organisation after falling out with the founding editor, Robin Shepherd. He has been a member of conservative think-tanks such as the Bow Group and the Henry Jackson Society, and was involved in an attempted foundation of the UK version of the Tea Party movement. He and James Delingpole set up the London edition of the American conservative news outlet Breitbart News.

UKIP

Following his period with the Conservatives, Kassam became a UKIP voter in late 2013, joined the party early in the following year, and soon became Farage's senior advisor.

Leadership candidate

After the resignation of Diane James as UKIP leader in October 2016, Kassam launched a campaign to become the new leader. On announcing his bid, he stated that he wanted to "stop infighting within UKIP", "address the deep cultural and social divides in this country", and "to become the real opposition and put this feckless Labour Party to bed." His campaign slogan was "Make UKIP great again". In an interview with Evan Davis on the BBC's Newsnight, Kassam announced his intentions to resolve UKIP's "existential crisis" and pledged to increase UKIP's membership to 100,000.

Kassam's activity on social media has attracted negative attention. In June 2016 he posted a tweet (later deleted) suggesting First Minister of Scotland Nicola Sturgeon should have her "mouth taped shut. And her legs, so she can't reproduce". After being criticised by the Scottish National Party MP Stewart McDonald on twitter, Kassam replied that he would not be lectured to by a "National Socialist party". He later apologised. He has tweeted in the past that Suzanne Evans, a candidate in the second 2016 leadership election, should "fuck off for good", and questioned whether Labour MP Angela Eagle attended a "special needs class".

After Evans said on Andrew Marr's Sunday morning television programme that her "far right" and "toxic" rival would take the party away from the interests of ordinary people, Kassam questioned Suzanne Evans' leadership capabilities and asserted that she had made "smears" against him. Farage refuted Evans' comments about Kassam shortly afterwards.

At the launch of his leadership campaign, Kassam called for a national referendum on the right of women in the UK to wear the niqāb, claimed then-U.S. presidential candidates Donald Trump does not hold anti-Muslim opinions, and cast doubt on the multiple claims of sexual assault made against Trump. He also labelled his movement as Faragist and quipped that he was the "Faragest of the Faragists". Kassam gained the personal support of Arron Banks, the principal funder of UKIP.

Kassam "suspended", or withdrew, from the leadership contest on 31 October 2016, a few hours before nominations closed. Having concluded that he had only a slight chance of winning, citing insufficient funds, he criticised the media attention he received and was critical of the media intimidation of his parents. He also questioned the fairness of a UKIP ballot.

Later developments

In his October 2016 Newsnight interview, Kassam suggested that Donald Trump would be a better President of the United States than Hillary Clinton. A few days after the result of the American presidential election was announced, Kassam accompanied Nigel Farage when he was the first British politician to meet President-elect Trump, at Trump Tower.