Musk Backs Restore Britain in Burnham By-Election Showdown

2 min read

Elon Musk has thrown his weight behind Rupert Lowe’s Restore Britain party ahead of the Makerfield by-election. The Telegraph has the story:

On Sunday morning, the billionaire Chief Executive of Tesla posted his support for Rupert Lowe’s Restore Britain party on X.

The first poll of the by-election campaign showed Reform on 40%, just three points behind Labour’s Andy Burnham on 43% in a knife-edge battle for the seat.

However, the poll of 504 adults by Survation showed Restore Britain in third place on 7%, potentially scooping up votes that could secure the constituency for Nigel Farage’s Reform.

It means the division on the Right could harm Reform’s chances of victory and increase the risk of handing the seat to Mr Burnham, who is seen by many Labour supporters as a potential saviour to lift the party out of its electoral crisis.

It is also likely to intensify the bitter rivalry between Mr Lowe and Mr Farage after their public falling-out more than a year ago. …

On Sunday morning, Mr Musk, who frequently comments on X about British political leaders, posted “Restore Britain” while retweeting a post by Mr Lowe. The billionaire has previously supported Mr Farage. …

Responding to Mr Musk’s intervention, Mr Lowe said: “Elon Musk backing Restore Britain sends a clear message that real change is possible and the establishment is losing control. Makerfield will show Britain the way. We’re not here to patch up a broken system, we are here to restore our country.” …

Mr Musk backed Restore Britain when it was launched last year by Mr Lowe, stating on X: “It will win. It must win. To Save Britain.”

Worth reading in full.

N.B. The Survation poll appears at odds with Restore’s own feedback on the doorstep in Makerfield, with 24.6% supporting the party in a sample of 1,010:

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41 Comments
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JXB
JXB
3 months ago

Musk is a pot stirrer (Polite version). Best not to pay too much attention. People on social media believe everybody else is.
Shock! Most people aren’t.

I doubt Restore will take votes from Reform UK, because it is unlikely those who say they (Farage haters probably) would vote for Restore would have voted in the first place for Reform UK, or who will vote at all.

One of the biggest hurdles for a political Party is to convince voters if they vote for them it will not be a “wasted” vote, ie what is the chance they can win? People do like to think their vote counts.

This was in former days the problem UKIP had, and even the Lib Dems to some extent in certain constituencies. It is a hurdle Reform has got over in a remarkably short time, with a well organised and executed plan to establish a strong support base across the Country, attract significant donation to build up a “war chest”, and plant itself firmly as a key element in local government. Restore? None of this.

Both Reform UK and Restore voters must agree on the same thing, they want rid of… Read more »

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  JXB

MP RUPERT LOWE’S RESTORE BRITAIN is the only way to save the country.

“Tactical Voting” is just support for the Uniparty.

Smudger
Smudger
3 months ago
Reply to  JXB

“Anyone voting for Labour is a psychiatric case.” We could apply the same to anyone voting Tory too!

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  Smudger

And the LibDems, which have been called “The Brigadoon Party”, because they completely disappear after elections, only to reappear just before the next one, as election wreckers.

EppingBlogger
EppingBlogger
3 months ago

Elon Musk should keep his nose out of UK politics. But let’s hope the good people of Makerfield respond the same wsy ss Brexit voters when a prominent American tells them how to vote.

we all remember Obama telling us we had to remain in the EU but we ignored him. Perhaps he even drove a per cent or two to Remain.

For a man who seemed to understand the damage done by decades of two party oligopoly in the US you would think he would support a change here. By encouraging Lowe he just helps the old UK Uniparty. Is he getting a deal from somewhere for this.

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  EppingBlogger

Rubbish! Everyone has the right to express their opinion of any election in the world!

ChrisA
ChrisA
3 months ago

Lowe said he was doing it for Britain, now he will intentionally split his paltry 7% of the vote off Reform to make sure Labour gets its even more out in the open Commie leader.
Thanks Rupert…..

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  ChrisA

The Uniparty have retained their absolute grip on power by using the jaded old “Don’t split the vote!” argument = “Don’t vote for the one you want!”, which was always complete cobblers.

ChrisA
ChrisA
3 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

I don’t particularly want Lowe over Reform, all that talk of ego’s and such and he’s just as bad. I hope you enjoy Commie Burnham.
I will live in the real world over best intentions or pipe dreams.

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  ChrisA

“Bah! Humbug!”

Covid-1984
Covid-1984
3 months ago

Musk fell out with Trump, how did that go?. Musk is a lapsed Democrat (Socialist) who wants a useless Labour Party. Ignore him Makesfield

shred
shred
4 months ago

Both of the likely candidates to succeed Starmer are useless and support additional taxes and rejoining the EU. But Burnham is an unprincipled vacillating fool who would probably do less harm by not adopting the worst policies. If Reform plus Restore votes would let him in but discredit Labour, it could be the best for the country. He will still be very unpopular.

JXB
JXB
3 months ago
Reply to  shred

The real problem is there really is no more tax to be had, so instead they will just keep borrowing to pile on to the £2 9 trillion.

However, despite Burnham dismissing the Bond markets are irrelevant, they do dictate what borrowing costs will be or whether they will lead at all.

Government borrowing is projected at £100 billion this year, 55% of which will be used to service the debt. Yields are now higher than caused by the Truss “incident” and during the 2008 financial crisis.

It is estimated that 55% of money borrowed to service debt, will increase towards 100% by end of decade without change in course.

£2.9 trillion = the entire economic output of the UK. The Bond markets consider risk of default. The higher the yields, the higher the perceived risk to the point where risk is so high, they stop lending.

What is likely is that as borrowing costs soar, the money-printing presses will be speeded up to avoid more borrowing so the Government can continue to fill the pockets of the our NHS heroes and other public service workers, pay State pensions, continue to fund our international welfare… Read more »

Wroxetan
Wroxetan
4 months ago

Restore cannot win but will take votes from Reform.
I question why this is is the first election in which it has chosen to stand a candidate(as Restore) against Reform, possibly sabotaging the chance to destroy Labour for good.
I have to date supported Restore but believe this is a serious tactical error which will damage both parties and our country.

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  Wroxetan

Nonsense! The RESTORE BRITAIN party has only been in existence for 3 months! How many by-elections have there been since Feb 13th, 2026?

JXB
JXB
3 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

Well there were all those local council elections earlier this month…

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  JXB

Yes, and RESTORE BRITAIN made a CLEAN SWEEP in Great Yarmouth, where they won every seat in which they put up candidates.

ChrisA
ChrisA
3 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

Yep, 24 Restore councillors to the 2400 Reform.

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  ChrisA

“I don’t care!”

Monro
Monro
4 months ago

The great British Public suspect that systemic reform is required.

It may very well be that Burnham Wood installed in Dunces Lane is the final step required to enable a serious reforming government to succeed at the next general election.

transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
4 months ago
Reply to  Monro

As I posted earlier, someone I know who passes for a serious grownup blames Farage for attacks on synagogues. The great British public varies….

JXB
JXB
3 months ago
Reply to  Monro

Trouble, trouble, trouble, fire burn and cauldron bubble.

Heretic
Heretic
4 months ago

Well done to Elon Musk for exercising his right to Freedom of Speech, and backing MP Rupert Lowe’s Restore Britain candidate in the Makerfield election!

The only thing that worries me is that the Globalists will try to bring Rupert down using a “Honey Trap”, as they used on Andrew Bridgen, though he quickly escaped. I hope Rupert’s beloved wife of 40 years will advise Rebecca Shepherd to stop flaunting her cleavage, because it doesn’t do her credibility any good as a parliamentary candidate.

I think all male news presenters forced to share the show with females with low-cut tops or thigh-high slits in skirts should teach them a lesson by emulating them on air, unbuttoning their shirts down to the same level as the women, or slitting their trousers up to the thigh, to show how foolish it is for women to flaunt their reproductive organs and bare flesh at work, unless they are swimming teachers. Ditto in Parliament.

Sparrowhawk
Sparrowhawk
4 months ago

Good idea Elon. Just another foulup on your part. You need to concentrate on your core businesses, instead of ensuring that Andy Burnham gets elected, for your antipathy towards Nigel Farage means you want the anti-Labour vote split apart.
Brilliant.

Remember how you accused the British cave expert who rescued those Thai kids of being a paedo? Because he has a Thai wife? You should engage your brain before opening your mouth.

By the way, I hear the current BBC series on you is a typical Left-wing hatchet job. They give a platform to all the censorship crew Elon kicked out of Twitter, never mentioning WHY they got the boot.

Then they referred to AfD as far-right. Scum, all of them. The AfD are the only hope for Germany, and with them the whole of Europe.

Heretic
Heretic
4 months ago
Reply to  Sparrowhawk

But the AfD LEADER who chooses not to live in Germany, but in Switzerland with her Sri Lankan “wife” and “two sons” (who’s their father?) is NOT the only hope for Germany and the whole of Europe. They can do better.

Heretic
Heretic
4 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

Lead election candidate of Germany’s far-right AfD party ‘secretly employed Syrian asylum seeker as cleaner’ | The Independent

… and she claims her official German residence as her parents’ home to avoid paying Swiss taxation.

ChrisA
ChrisA
3 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

Why wouldn’t you arrange your tax affairs as sensibly as possible, which I could claim tax haven status!

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  ChrisA

Why would the people of ANY country vote for a candidate who chooses NOT to live in that country?

JXB
JXB
3 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

Why would people vote for a system where their laws are made by people who don’t live in their Country and are not from their Country, and ultimately decided by foreign politicians for whom they cannot vote?

Oh yes… Remainers and the people of the EU.

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  JXB

Excellent point!

Sparrowhawk
Sparrowhawk
3 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

They vote for the PARTY, not your much-disliked leader’s lifestyle, and polls show today that the AfD is now ahead of all other German parties and growing.

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  Sparrowhawk

But that leader REPRESENTS the party, and their lifestyle cannot be somehow separated from it.

Another good example is in today’s news from Australia, in which Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party was inveigled into backing Jason Virgo, former member of the Australian Sex Party (??!!), as a One Nation candidate, who then won the election by promising to tackle out-of-control Third World Immigration, especially Muslim immigration.

Only after he won the election did he issue a tearful speech saying how much he “loved migrants” and loved his male partner, who turns out to be an Indonesian Muslim man, and most of their friends are Third World Ethnic immigrants to Australia.

I couldn’t find any reports about Senator Pauline Hanson’s reaction to his getting elected under FALSE PRETENCES.

JXB
JXB
3 months ago
Reply to  ChrisA

There is no such thing as tax-haven status. So-called tax havens offer very low tax on investment income on money kept there.

The money invested is from income taxed in the home tax jurisdiction and transferred offshore. The advantage then is more of the investment income kept offshore can be re-invested there than would be the case if it were earned in the UK and taxed at a higher rate – the benefit is economically more efficient resulting in higher accumulated earnings.

The investment income is not taxable in the home tax jurisdiction unless and until it is transferred into the home tax jurisdiction, when it is taxed as usual.

JXB
JXB
3 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

I very much doubt Swiss taxes are higher than Germany’s.

But tax rules take into consideration how many days an individual spends inside the tax jurisdiction, where their primary source of income arises, as well as their declared domicile.

Boris Becker got caught out this way. He declared his primary residence outside Germany, but the tax authorities investigated and found he spent more than 180 days in Germany a tax-year, and clobbered him for back-tax, interest, fines.

Unless the AfD candidate spends in aggregate 181 days or more in Switzerland, or has income generated in Switzerland, they would not be liable for tax there. In the latter case they would also be liable for tax in Germany too.

Sparrowhawk
Sparrowhawk
3 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

The AfD now command support of 29% of the German people, ahead of ALL other parties, including the so-called “Conservatives” CDU. There are calls from the Leftist SPD and Greens to BAN the AfD. This is fascism, pure and simple, at the same time that Merz (the most loathed leader in Europe, including Starmer) is calling for re-militarisation of Germany.

Once they reach the “golden 30%” they become capable of forming a blocking minority in the Bundestag.

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  Sparrowhawk

It’s as if the Globalists decide, “We will allow the patriots to have a patriotic party, but the leader must fit into one of our categories of Subverting Western Christian Morality, Handing Control to Muslims, Miscegenation, etc.”

Smudger
Smudger
3 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

Not at all ideal. But she has got the Right wing vote out where other ‘straight’ people have failed.

Heretic
Heretic
3 months ago
Reply to  Smudger

“She” has not done that. The party policies have done that.

What other right wing, conservative choices do the German voters have? Very few, if any, I should imagine.

Smudger
Smudger
3 months ago
Reply to  Heretic

Will you be pleased if “she” delivers on the Party’s pledges when, hopefully, AfD form a Right Wing government?

Marcus Aurelius knew
Marcus Aurelius knew
4 months ago
Reply to  Sparrowhawk

Hear hear. And so many more things I know about Elon Himself since peeking behind the curtain over 15 years ago. The guy is nasty, through and through.

JohnK
JohnK
4 months ago

Burnham will be happy with Musk’s influence, if it splits the opposition; spot the cynic here.

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