Reform's Laila Cunningham claimed Shabana Mahmood protects Pakistani vote base Submitted by Imran Mulla on Thu, 01/08/2026 - 14:45 London mayoral candidate also said Donald Trump was right to say London under Sadiq Khan wants 'to go to Sharia law' Westminster City councillor Laila Cunningham (right) attends a press conference with Reform UK leader Nigel Farage (background) in London on 7 January (AFP) Off Reform UK 's candidate to replace Sadiq Khan as London's mayor has accused Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood of not imposing a visa ban on Pakistan in order to protect a "Pakistani voter base". Former Conservative councillor Laila Cunningham also endorsed US President Donald Trump's claim in September, widely accused of being racist, that London with Khan as mayor wants "to go to Sharia law". On Wednesday, Reform leader Nigel Farage announced Cunningham as the party's London head and candidate for the next mayoral election. Cunningham, who is of Egyptian origin, has since received a storm of abuse from far-right X accounts online for being Muslim. In an interview published last week with YouTuber Andrew Gold, not previously reported on, she took aim at Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood for not having imposed a visa ban on Pakistan in punishment for the country not taking in Pakistani grooming gang offenders from Britain. Gold asked Cunningham whether this was because of "a kind of Pakistani support base that she can’t offend lest she lose votes". Cunningham responded: "That is the assumption, or else you’d crack down on it." She added: "Any country that’s not taking back their criminals has to be dealt with. But I’m not seeing that from her, so you must assume that there is a Pakistani vote base that she wants to protect." There has been no evidence or indication that Mahmood is seeking to "protect" a "Pakistani vote base". 'Conflict of interest' Cunningham also said: "I don't really want a home secretary whose decisions stem from her religion first and her nationality second." She said that "there can be a conflict of interest, and that is troubling for me, and that maybe goes back to why we don't have a visa ban on Pakistan. "For me, there are Pakistanis that are doing harm on our country. They [Pakistan] have to take them back, and if they don’t, no one’s allowed in." 'King Charles is a secret Muslim!': The bizarre things I heard at the Reform party conference Read More » Middle East Eye has contacted Mahmood's office and the Labour Party press office for comment. Mahmood has never said her decisions stem from her religion first and her nationality second, although she has previously said that Muslim faith was the "absolute driver of everything that I do". The home secretary also told The Times: "My faith calls me to public service. The fundamental values of my faith around decency and fairness, not wanting to live in a society where there’s conflict, those fundamental drivers I get from my faith." In a Daily Mail article in September 2025, Cunningham also said that "Trump is right" in his claim that in London, "where you have a terrible mayor, and it's been changed, so changed. Now they want to go to Sharia law." She argued: "The uncomfortable truth is that Trump is right: Britain has allowed a shadow system to exist alongside our own courts." She went on to talk not about Khan and London but about "Sharia councils", writing "there are thought to be around 85 across the country". In the same piece, Cunningham falsely claimed that "Labour is now promising new 'Islamophobia laws' that risk criminalising anyone who dares to criticise Islam." The Labour government is mulling over adopting a potential new definition of "anti-Muslim hatred" which would not be legally binding. In an interview with journalist Harry Cole on Wednesday, Cunningham insisted that "I don't see myself as a British Muslim, a British Egyptian. I see myself as a British person, that’s it." She said in the interview with Gold last week: "I’m not part of a Muslim community, I’m part of a British community." Cunningham claimed that "there are Muslim communities in this country who bring shame on the rest of the Muslims". She added that "for me, religion is a sort of good" and said there are "a lot of Muslims like me who don’t want to be associated with the Pakistani rape gangs" or "with the people in Tower Hamlets who are only in burqas". Call for a Muslim Brotherhood ban Cunningham further claimed in the interview that "in Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood is banned because that kind of radical Islam is unacceptable, but here it’s allowed to flourish". Reform leader Farage pledged last September that a Reform government would ban the Muslim Brotherhood, one of the world's largest political Islam groups. Farage's Reform appoints director of 'anti-Muslim' think tank as senior advisor Read More » The Brotherhood has long maintained that it is a peaceful organisation that wishes to participate in politics democratically, but it is considered a major threat by many autocratic governments in the Middle East and North Africa. On Wednesday it emerged that the United Arab Emirates paid for Farage to travel to Abu Dhabi to meet senior officials over a "shared opposition to the Muslim Brotherhood". Cunningham, a former public prosecutor who is now a Reform councillor, defected to the party from the Tories last year. Farage said on Wednesday that she will be prominent in Reform's campaigning for local elections this May. The next London mayoral elections are in 2028. 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