Robinson was hosted by a senior US official Joe Rittenhouse, who said in an X post he was "honored to have free speech warrior" Robinson at the State Department. Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, said he had the "privilege of an invite" to the State Department and was in the country "making alliances and friendships".
Robinson, 42, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, was driving a silver Bentley Bentayga SUV and was on his way to the Spanish tourist hotspot of Benidorm when he was stopped by officers at the Channel tunnel in Folkestone on 28 July 2024, Westminster magistrates court previously heard. Police were suspicious of the far-right activist's vague replies about what he was doing and demanded access to his iPhone under schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act, the court was told.
On the last day of the trial, prosecutor Jo Morris said the counter-terrorism powers used by police to stop Robinson exist to allow for intelligence gathering and that police had a reasonable suspicion that he still had links to far-right activists, even after the disbandment of the English Defence League (EDL). Although his membership of the EDL has come to an end, his views have not gone away.
The far-right activist Tommy Robinson attracted many more people than the authorities had expected to his Unite the Kingdom rally last weekend despite his several criminal convictions and reputation for inflammatory language. But why did thousands of people travel miles to the heart of Westminster to march with a man reviled by mainstream politics carrying a banner calling for Remigration Now?
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Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, 42, most commonly known as Tommy Robinson, is a British far-right activist who organised the Unite the Kingdom march in London on 13 September. After losing his job as an engineering apprentice for assaulting a police officer, Robinson moved into activism in 2009 by founding the English Defence League (EDL), an Islamophobic organisation forged in the football terraces in Luton before spreading nationally.
Our post-event investigation is ongoing and officers have trawled through hundreds of hours of CCTV footage and continue to review evidence to help with enquiries. We have identified a number of people we want to speak to in connection with a range of offences and we are asking for the public's help to track them down We know people may have travelled from outside of London, so we're asking for people across the country to take a look at those pictured
Sit Down was used in a video posted by Robinson on X that was highlighting the size of the protest. In his own post on the platform shortly after 5pm on Saturday, when many of the protesters were still gathered around Whitehall and Trafalgar Square, Booth criticised the activist for including the 1989 record in his content. The 65-year-old said: Disgusted to see the cynical use of Sit Down by TRobinsonNewEra. No permission was granted, and we are looking into our options.
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