On 11 March 2024, Lee Anderson, the MP for Ashfield, announced he was defecting to Reform UK, becoming the party’s first-ever member of parliament.

The move came just over two weeks after Anderson had the Conservative whip suspended for refusing to apologise for comments made about the mayor of London, Sadiq Khan. In an interview, Anderson had claimed that “Islamists” had “got control” of the mayor.

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In February 2023, Anderson was appointed to the position of deputy chairman of the Conservative Party by the prime minister, Rishi Sunak. Having invited Anderson to assume this post, Sunak celebrated the Conservative MP – an outspoken voice on the right of the party – as a champion of the “red wall” seats the Tories won at the 2019 general election.

In November 2023, Anderson told GB News the government should “ignore the law” and “put the planes in the air now” after the supreme court ruled against the Rwanda deportations scheme.

Some weeks later in early 2024, Anderson was one of around 60 Conservative MPs who supported amendments to the government’s Safety of Rwanda (Asylum and Immigration) Bill. The amendments, proposed by Conservative MPs Sir Bill Cash and Robert Jenrick, sought to strengthen the proposed legislation by limiting the ability of individual asylum seekers to prevent their deportation to Rwanda, under the terms of the government’s flagship removals scheme.

​​The bill later passed its third reading in the commons on 17 January 2024 by 320 votes to 276. A total of 11 Conservative MPs, including Suella Braverman and Jenrick, voted against the legislation. Anderson ultimately abstained. The Tory MP said he had planned to vote against the bill but changed his mind after he saw Labour MPs “giggling and laughing and taking the mick”.

Some weeks later on 23 February 2024, Anderson returned to GB News to discuss a recent Daily Telegraph article, penned by Braverman. In it, the former home secretary argued that “the Islamists, the extremists and the antisemites are in charge now.”

Anderson mostly agreed with Braverman’s thesis.

He stated: “I don’t actually believe that the Islamists have got control of our country, but what I do believe is they’ve got control of Khan and they’ve got control of London, and they’ve got control of Starmer as well.”

He added: “People are just turning up in their thousands, and doing anything they want, and they are laughing at our police. This stems with Khan, he’s actually given our capital city away to his mates.”

Khan said the comments were Islamophobic, anti-Muslim and racist.

On 24 February, Anderson was suspended from the Conservative Party.

A spokesperson for the chief whip, Simon Hart, said: “Following his refusal to apologise for comments made yesterday, the chief whip has suspended the Conservative whip from Lee Anderson MP.”

Anderson refused to apologise for his remarks but admitted they had been “clumsy” in a statement on 27 February.

The independent MP commented: “When you think you are right you should never apologise because to do so would be a sign of weakness. My words may have been clumsy but my words were borne out of sheer frustration at what is happening to our beautiful capital city.”

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Anderson was unveiled as Reform’s first MP at a press conference on 11 March, ending weeks of speculation about his political future.

At the time, Reform was polling at around 13%.

Appearing alongside Richard Tice, the Reform leader, Anderson said he was “prepared to gamble on myself” because he knew “how many people support Reform and what they have to say”.

The Reform MP added: “My opinions are not controversial. They are opinions which are shared by millions of people up and down the country. It’s not controversial to fight back in the culture war — a culture war that is sweeping our nation.

“But now like millions of people in this country, I feel that we are slowly giving our country away. We are giving away our way of life. We are allowing people to erase our history.

“We are giving up our streets to a minority of people who literally hate our way of life. We are letting people into our country that will never integrate or adopt our British values.”

Tice hailed Anderson as Reform’s “champion of the red wall”.

Anderson had previously mocked Tice as a “pound-shop Nigel Farage” and said Reform was “not a proper political party”.

Speaking to GB News mere months prior to his defection, Anderson said: “This [Reform UK] is not a proper political party, by the way, this is a company…

“I think [Richard Tice is] a pound shop Nigel Farage and every time he opens his mouth recently on whichever media platform, he is coming across as Reform’s answer to Diane Abbott. He’s just saying ridiculous things.”

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Anderson’s defection to Reform UK underlined the threat Reform UK posed to the Conservative Party as an insurgent party on the right of British politics – one untainted by any record in government.

At the 2024 general election, Anderson was returned as the Reform MP for Ashfield with a 5,509-vote majority. He was the first of five Reform MPs, including Farage and Tice, to win a commons seat.