Background After the
2016 United Kingdom European Union membership referendum on the UK leaving the EU ("
Brexit"), Prime Minister
David Cameron suggested that Russia "might be happy" with a positive Brexit vote. The official Remain campaign accused the
Kremlin of secretly backing a positive Brexit vote.
Before the vote • 22 July 2014, Laurence Levy, a lawyer with the U.S. law firm
Bracewell & Giuliani, advised U.S. heiress
Rebekah Mercer, American media executive
Steve Bannon, and British businessman
Alexander Nix on the legality of their company,
Cambridge Analytica, being involved in
U.S. elections. He advised that Nix and any foreign nationals without a
green card working for the company not be involved in any decisions about work the company performs for any clients related to
U.S. elections. He further advised Nix to recuse himself from any involvement with the company's
U.S. election work because he is not a
U.S. citizen. • 26–27 September 2015, during the
UKIP annual conference at the
Doncaster Racecourse, British political activist
Andy Wigmore met Alexander Udod, a Russian diplomat and suspected Russian intelligence officer, who in 2018 was expelled from the U.K. in retaliation for the
poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal. In October, Udod arranged a November lunch for Wigmore, British businessman
Arron Banks and the Russian ambassador to London,
Alexander Yakovenko. • 24 October 2015, Arron Banks sent an email to Steve Bannon and others to request help from Cambridge Analytica, where Bannon was a VP, with fundraising in the U.S. for the
Leave.EU campaign. Foreign contributions to British political campaigns are illegal. Banks came under criminal investigation in 2018 in part over questions about Leave.EU's funding sources. • 6 November 2015, Wigmore and Banks had lunch with Yakovenko at the ambassador's residence in London; they briefed him on
Brexit. In a June 2018 interview, Wigmore told
The Washington Post his goal for the meeting was to discuss finding a buyer for a banana plantation in
Belize. Yakovenko introduces Wigmore and Banks to
Russian oligarch Siman Povarenkin and documents related to the meeting suggest Banks was offered business deals, per
The Guardian reports from 2018. • March 2016,
Philip Hammond, the former Secretary for Defence and
Foreign Secretary (later the
Chancellor of the Exchequer) stated in a speech "the only country who would like us to leave the EU is Russia".
After the 23 June 2016 vote 2016 • 21 July 2016, Wigmore and
Nigel Farage encountered staffers for Mississippi Governor
Phil Bryant at the bar in the Hilton Hotel. A staffer invited Wigmore and Farage to Mississippi. In February 2017, Bradshaw called on the British intelligence service,
Government Communications Headquarters, then under
Boris Johnson as Foreign Secretary, to reveal any information it had on Russian interference.
2017 • 26 February 2017, Andy Wigmore told
The Guardian that
Robert Mercer donated Cambridge Analytica's services to the
Leave.EU campaign. The
U.K. Electoral Commission said the donation was not declared. • 16 March 2017, The
American Association of Political Consultants (AAPC) gave an "International Consultant of the Year" award to Nigel Farage and
Leave.EU in
Huntington Beach, California. • 17–25 March 2017, While in
Orange County, California, Farage and Arron Banks attended
GOP gatherings at
Scott Baugh's invitation.
Splitting California into two states is discussed at two of the gatherings. Afterwards
The Washington Times and
The Sunday Times, London reported that Baugh and
Gerry Gunster were hiring Farage and Banks to help fundraise in California for a campaign to split the state in two. Baugh denies the story saying he only, "asked Farage if he would be interested in talking to some of the county's GOP movers and shakers.". • October 2017, Members of Parliament in the
Culture, Media and Sport Committee demanded that Facebook, Twitter, Google and other social media corporations disclose all adverts and details of payments by Russia in the Brexit campaign. • November 2017, it became public knowledge that
Matthew Elliott, the chief executive of
Vote Leave, was a founding member of
Conservative Friends of Russia, and had been a target asset by someone known to be a Russian spy. • 12 December 2017, members of the
US Congress Ruben Gallego,
Eric Swalwell and
Gerry Connolly wrote to the Director of National Intelligence requesting information on Russian interference in the Brexit vote. On 13 December 2017,
Facebook stated that it found no significant Russian activity during Brexit, but this was immediately rejected by the committee chair,
Damian Collins, as being information that was already public after US investigations into Russian interference.
2018 • January 2018, a
US Senate minority report suggested possible ways Russia may have influenced the Brexit campaign. It stated, • 19 March 2018,
Channel 4 broadcast its investigative documentary on Cambridge Analytica. • June 2018,
The Guardian suggested that
Arron Banks, the biggest donor to the campaign for leaving, and co-organiser of
Leave.EU received the offer of a Russian gold mine, and had had a series of meetings with the Russian Ambassador. On 14 June 2018, Banks appeared before Parliamentary committee hearing, where he appeared to admit to having lied about his engagements with Russians, and later walked out refusing to answer further questions by citing a luncheon appointment with the
Democratic Unionist Party. • July 2018, the
House of Commons Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee, released an interim report on 'Disinformation and ‘fake news’', stating that Russia had engaged in "unconventional warfare" through Twitter and other social media against the United Kingdom, designed to amplify support for a "leave" vote in Brexit. • 20 September 2018,
AggregateIQ, a Canadian political consultancy and analytics company, received the first
General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) notice issued by the
Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) for using people's data "for purposes which they would not have expected." Various pro-Brexit campaigns paid the company £3.5 million to target ads at prospective voters. While its Brexit work was before the GDPR went into effect, it was fined because it retained and continued to use the data after the GDPR came into full force. The company is affiliated with
SCL Group and
Cambridge Analytica, and Cambridge Analytica employees sometimes call AggregateIQ "our Canadian office." • 1 November 2018, The
British National Crime Agency opens a criminal investigation into Arron Banks upon referral from the
Electoral Commission and concluded "we have reasonable grounds to suspect that: Mr Banks was not the true source of the £8m reported as loans" and "Various criminal offences may have been committed." The commission believes Banks facilitated a loan from Rock Holdings to his Leave.EU campaign. Rock Holdings is barred from funding campaigns in the U.K. under British election law because it is on the
Isle of Man, which is a
possession of the British Crown but not part of the United Kingdom.
2019 • February 2019,
The Guardian reported that Brittany Kaiser, former business development director of SCL Group, was subpoenaed by
Robert Mueller. Her spokesman said she was cooperating fully with
his investigation. She was the first person with links to both
Brexit and the Trump campaign known to have been questioned by Mueller. • 17 October 2019, the
Intelligence and Security Committee of the UK Parliament passed a completed report on allegations that Russian government-sponsored activities had an effect on the outcome of the referendum to Downing Street. • 4 November 2019, Downing Street commented that the report received on 17 October will not be published prior to the
2019 UK General Election.
2023 • 19 January 2023, the
European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg asked the UK government to respond to allegations of Russian interference. This follows requests from lawmakers from the Labour party, the
SNP and the Green Party, and following a rejection of the case by the
High Court of Justice in London in 2021. ==Social media==