Research from the Financial Times indicates that Rupert Lowe — founder of the extreme-right Restore Britain — has more reach on social media platform X than Reform’s Nigel Farage. In large part, Lowe owes his success to billionaire Elon Musk, who bought out Twitter in 2022 (and then had a highly public fallout with Farage in 2025).
Since launching Restore back in February, ten of Lowe’s X posts have received over 10-million views. Meanwhile, whilst Farage has over three times Lowe’s follower count, none of his posts have reached a similar mark.
Whilst Restore currently consists of — in Farage’s words — “one man and a social media account”, it’s having an outsized effect on Reform. During the local elections, the Restore-backed Great Yarmouth First won all nine seats it contested. As such, it prevented Reform UK from forming a majority in Norfolk County Council.
Rupert Lowe — splitting the far-right vote
Now, ahead of the crucial Makerfield by-election, the same pattern looks set to repeat itself. A source close to Reform stated that the party’s own polling put Reform at 34% of the vote. That’s 8 points behind Labour candidate Andy Burnham’s 42%, which could see him take the seat (and open a path to leadership of the party).
Meanwhile, Restore is reportedly hovering at around 18%. As such, it certainly appears that the newer far-right joke of a party is blocking its larger counterpart’s potential victory.
Regarding this fractioning of the UK’s political landscape, Luke Tryl — UK director of political research organisation More In Common — wrote that:
In the past most would stick with the big 3 or 4 [political parties]. Some people were habitual swing voters, most stuck with parties even if they didn’t like everything they advocated. It was best fit rather than perfect match.
Social media changes that, it reduces barriers to entry for new parties and enables more choice. Increasingly we find can vote for parties that directly fit our world view because of the platform They are given to reach people directly as Lowe has shown.
Reform was a product of that opening, but what’s striking is Restore shows it’s not the end point. For some Reform involves too much compromise and so they are able to go for a more “full fat version” and so rather than the 7 party system in Britain being the new end point it could just be the start
Whilst Lowe’s party wouldn’t win either in the Makerfield vote-splitting scenario, we at the Canarydoubt that he’ll mind all that much. Along with an unhealthy dose of extremist bigotry, Lowe seems to be motivated by pure spite. Before Farage gave him the boot in 2025 for sexist bullying, Lowe was actually a member of Reform.
The Musk factor
And this is where Elon Musk comes in. In that same year, Musk turned his back on his former friend Farage due to the party leader’s (lukewarm) condemnation of extreme-right grifter Tommy Robinson. After Robinson was jailed for making repeated false claims about a Syrian refugee, Farage stated that:
I’m not giving up principles. I do not allow former BNP (British National Party) activists into this party. That’s a golden rule.
Given that Musk is a big fan of the fascist dirtbag (Robinson, not the other two), this didn’t sit well with him. Instead, and in spite of never having met him at the time, Musk suddenly started recommending Lowe as leader of Reform.
Now that Lowe has formed his own party, it appears that Musk’s patronage went with him. In a post which recieved some 24-million views, the billionaire urged his followers to:
Join Rupert Lowe in Restore Britain.
In return, Lowe has launched an attack on the Online Safety Act. That’s the law under which Ofcom investigated Musk when his Grok chatbot generated thousands of non-consensual sexual images of both adults and children.
‘Pure algorithmic patronage’
Given his ownership of X (and his manipulation of its algorithms), Musk’s support has also translated into massive social media attention for Lowe. University of Bath digital futures professor Olivia Brown explained that x’s algorithm is:
attuned to Musk’s engagement particularly. […]
You can’t deny the sheer level of engagement that Lowe is having in comparison with other political figures. I wouldn’t be surprised if it transfers into a genuine impact in the by-election.
Lowe’s most popular post — promising “instant deportation for foreign nationals found carrying” knives — reached 61m views.
Beyond direct reach, X is also a significant source of funding for the Restore leader. Since the tail end of 2024, he’s declared over £72,000 directly from his use of the platform. Meanwhile, Reform’s Farage, Richard Tice and Lee Anderson have just £33,000 between them.
The Canary’sRanjan Balakumaran characterised Musk’s payout to Lowe as:
a massive unchecked sum, handed to a nativist politician by a single foreign tech billionaire, creating a dangerous loophole that completely bypasses standard UK political funding laws.
This isn’t a grassroots shift – it’s pure, algorithmic patronage. Elon Musk fell out with Farage, and has turned X into a personal kingmaking tool, boosting Lowe’s extreme content directly into public feeds to manipulate the knife-edge Makerfield by-election.
Elon Musk, Rupert Lowe and X are merely a microcosm of the terrifying influence of far-right billionaires over the media and political landscapes that shape our lives.
In the current case in point, the sheer incompetence of the three main combatants has so far ensured their mutual dissatisfaction. However, there are far more skillful manipulators out there than Musk, and their pockets run almost as deep.
The super-rich are nothing less than an existential threat to democracy as we know it.
Featured image via Peter Nicholls/Getty Images
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