The campaign for former president Donald Trump has taken action against the UK’s Labour Party by filing a Federal Election Commission (FEC) complaint, accusing the party of interfering in the US election in favour of the Harris-Walz campaign. Media reports involving contact between Labour and the Harris campaign, as well as volunteering efforts from Labour activists, have been used as evidence in the claim. The Trump campaign has argued that these actions amount to illegal contributions. In response to the complaint, the Harris-Walz campaign has not yet provided a statement.
The complaint has referred to newspaper articles about the situation, in particular those articles that suggest Labour-linked individuals have travelled to the United States in order to campaign for Harris. These reports provide a “reasonable inference that the Labour Party has made, and the Harris campaign has accepted, illegal foreign national contributions”. The complaint also cites a social media post on LinkedIn which allegedly listed nearly 100 current and former party members who would be travelling to battleground states in the US, although it has since been deleted.
Labour activists have argued that they are campaigning in a personal capacity, unrelated to their official roles within the party and party funding. Foreign nationals are able to volunteer for US presidential campaigns, so long as they are not compensated. At present, there is no evidence that the Harris-Walz campaign knew about the alleged Labour Party actions.
In comparison to a similar international program in 2016, in which the Australian Labor Party sent delegates to campaign for Bernie Sanders, the Labour Party has not paid for flights or daily stipends for activists. In this case, the ALP and the campaign were fined $14,500 for their actions. Previously, contact between US Republicans and the UK’s Conservative Party is comparable to the current actions of Labour Party activists. The BBC has, as yet, not received a comment from the Harris-Walz campaign regarding the complaint
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