Zia Yusuf, the ‘British Muslim patriot’ Nigel Farage trusts with the border – POLITICO

The first time I meet Zia Yusuf we’re in a seafront hotel near the White Cliffs of Dover, the backdrop for so many of Britain’s hopes and fears about immigration.

It is early in Ramadan and Yusuf is fasting. He’s here to give his first major speech as Nigel Farage’s pick for home secretary if the insurgent Reform UK enters government — and the big new policy he’s unveiling centers on concerns Islam is displacing Christianity.

Yusuf has been a key player in professionalizing Farage’s right-wing movement, transforming Reform from a populist “start-up” into a more disciplined political machine. As a tech millionaire son of Sri Lankan immigrants, he occupies a powerful — and fairly unique — position: a self-described “proud British Muslim patriot” who uses his own success story to help sell a platform of mass deportations and shielding Christianity.