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This year’s local election results from the United Kingdom are in. The far-right, anti-immigrant Reform UK party made substantial gains, while the ruling Labour Party suffered heavy losses, signaling what London-based journalist Daniel Trilling calls a “wider fragmenting of politics” and a generational shift away from the two-party political system. We get an overview of major developments to the U.K. political scene from Trilling, including how Donald Trump’s transformation of the U.S. right-wing movement has inspired Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party, and how the Labour Party’s crackdown on pro-Palestine activism led to rising support for the left-wing Green Party. Trilling also discusses how populist sentiment continues to influence other countries in Europe after Hungary’s extremist leader Viktor Orbán suffered a major election defeat last month.

This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.

AMY GOODMAN: We begin today’s show looking at what’s been described as a political earthquake in Britain. In local elections last week, the far-right Reform UK party surged in popularity, while the Labour Party suffered heavy losses. The Reform UK party is led by Nigel Farage, who was the chief architect of Brexit, close ally of President Donald Trump. Farage celebrated his party’s success.

NIGEL FARAGE: But I think, overall, what’s happened is a truly historic shift in British politics. We’ve been so used to thinking about politics in terms of left and right, and yet what Reform are able to do is to win in areas that have always been Conservative, but, equally, we’re proving in a big way we can win in areas that Labour have dominated, frankly, since the end of World War I.

NIGEL FARAGE: But I think, overall, what’s happened is a truly historic shift in British politics. We’ve been so used to thinking about politics in terms of left and right, and yet what Reform are able to do is to win in areas that have always been Conservative, but, equally, we’re proving in a big way we can win in areas that Labour have dominated, frankly, since the end of World War I.

AMY GOODMAN: Calls are growing for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer to resign, after his Labour Party suffered historic losses. This is Starmer speaking Friday.

The UK’s Anti-Migrant Right Is Surging. Local Elections Will Test Their Power.

PRIME MINISTER KEIR STARMER: Let me be clear: These are really tough results. I’m not going to sugarcoat it. And we have lost brilliant Labour representatives, people who’ve put so much into their communities, so much into our party and our movement. And the voters have sent a message about the pace of change, how they want their lives improved. Labour was elected to meet those challenges, and I’m not going to walk away from those challenges and plunge the country into chaos. … Well, they’ve sent a message that the change that we promised isn’t being delivered in a way they can feel, and also, frankly, they’re fed up with years of the status quo. But we were elected to deal with those challenges, and I’m not going to walk away from that and to plunge the country into chaos.

PRIME MINISTER KEIR STARMER: Let me be clear: These are really tough results. I’m not going to sugarcoat it. And we have lost brilliant Labour representatives, people who’ve put so much into their communities, so much into our party and our movement. And the voters have sent a message about the pace of change, how they want their lives improved. Labour was elected to meet those challenges, and I’m not going to walk away from those challenges and plunge the country into chaos. … Well, they’ve sent a message that the change that we promised isn’t being delivered in a way they can feel, and also, frankly, they’re fed up with years of the status quo. But we were elected to deal with those challenges, and I’m not going to walk away from that and to plunge the country into chaos.

AMY GOODMAN: In a sign of the splintering of the British political system, the Conservative Party also suffered significant losses, while the Green Party won hundreds of council seats.

We go now to London, where we’re joined by the journalist and author Daniel Trilling. His new book is titled If We Tolerate This: How the British Establishment Made the Far Right Respectable.

Daniel, thanks so much for being with us. Why don’t you start off by responding to these historic losses of the Labour Party?

DANIEL TRILLING: Yeah. Thanks, Amy. So, absolutely right, this has been a real disaster for the Labour Party. It wasn’t quite as disastrous as had been predicted a few weeks ago, but they’ve sunk to new lows electorally around Britain. So, as well as losing hundreds of councilors in England, they lost very badly in the elections for the Welsh Parliament which were happening at the same time. Labour has dominated Welsh politics for over a century, and they’re now trailing behind the Welsh nationalist party, Plaid Cymru, and Reform, who’ve come in second.

But it was interesting to hear Nigel Farage’s spin on what happened in that clip you played of him earlier, because, yeah, this is historic. Reform have made this huge advance, you know, adding to their tally of council seats that they began to rack up last year in similar elections. But, actually, in terms of vote share, they underperformed expectations a bit. So, Reform got around 26, 27% of the vote overall. But they really benefited from this wider fragmenting of........

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