Reform UK leader Nigel Farage teased the crowd of party loyalists who showed up to its veterans’ event at an old guildhall in central London on Monday morning.
“It’s about time, isn’t it?” he said, trying to ramp up the mystery. But by the time he was halfway through his opening speech, many had already guessed what was happening. Farage announced the latest senior Tory defector, former home secretary Suella Braverman. She walked onstage to a standing ovation and cheers.
Reform has held events to unveil so many Tory defections recently, the announcements run to a standard playbook. A party event is organised, usually for late on a Monday morning, and ostensibly for some other reason. Farage then does a big reveal.
Tory former chancellor Nadhim Zahawi joined on Monday, January 12th. Danny Kruger joined on Monday, September 15th. Former Tory leadership contender Robert Jenrick joined on a Thursday, but his hand was forced.
Farage’s upstart party, which has promised its voters a break from the old order, has announced the defection of 20 former Tory MPs over the past 18 months, complicating its appeal to former Labour voters in working-class districts.
Reform UK MP Robert Jenrick, a recent Tory defector, looks on as Suella Braverman speaks to the media. Photograph: Leon Neal/Getty Images
Farage seems keen to take the risk. This suggests his primary aim in this May’s local elections in England – and devolved votes in Wales and Scotland – may be to finally kill off the Tories as a national political force, rather than to destroy Labour.
Most of the 20 defectors were no longer parliamentarians. But four sitting Tory MPs have joined since the July 2024 election – Braverman, Kruger, Jenrick and backbencher Andrew Rosindell, who joined last week.
Reform now has eight MPs. It won five in the general election and another in a byelection last year. Two of the 2024 group have left.
Braverman’s defection may be one of the least surprising Tory-to-Reform moves, but it is still among the most intriguing. For Farage, it is also one of the riskiest. Braverman is a box office figure in Westminster politics but she is unpredictable.
[ Suella Braverman defects to Nigel Farage’s Reform and slams Tory ‘lies’Opens in new window ]
Her husband, Rael Braverman, left the Conservatives for Reform in December 2024. He quit in July 2025, however, after senior Reform strategist Zia Yusuf launched a public attack on his wife and Jenrick.
Now she has gone the other way, slamming the Conservative door on the way out. She accused the Tories of “lies” over migration and told Reform that she finally felt “at home”. Her old party responded with a statement questioning her mental health, which it withdrew two hours later after criticism.
When Jenrick left, Tory leader Kemi Badenoch projected strength by pre-emptively sacking him. The now-withdrawn mental health statement suggests her handling of Braverman’s defection was less adroit.
Still, the exit of Jenrick and Braverman are seen not as signals of Badenoch’s weakness as Tory leader, but more as signs of her growing strength. Jenrick and Braverman both saw themselves as alternative Tory leaders. Badenoch’s recent improved performance led both to conclude their chance had gone.
As for Braverman, she was notorious as a Tory loose cannon. Boris Johnson made her attorney general – she thanked him by helping to bring him down. Liz Truss made her home secretary, but later sacked her for using personal email for work. Rishi Sunak reappointed her six days after, but she was later sacked again for undermining him. Loyalty to her leader is not Braverman’s political strong suit.
A Reform source told the Daily Mail last July they didn’t want her because “her record shows she is just too disruptive”. Now she is Farage’s latest new ex-Tory toy.
His list of former Tories now includes punchy characters such as Jenrick, Braverman, former culture secretary Nadine Dorries and former Tory vice-chairman Lee Anderson. Perhaps the most absorbing question in British politics is how the Reform UK leader plans to control such notorious egos, not to mention his own.