A far-right millionaire with Ulster loyalist connections plans to use his international social media network, which backed Donald Trump, to support Scottish independence. Jim Dowson, a former financial backer of the British National party and former member of Britain First, confirmed on Monday that he will be deploying his “Patriotic News Agency” and other networks with their bases in Hungary and Serbia to promote Scottish separatism.
Dowson’s social media group pumped out pro-Trump “news” during the latter stages of the US presidential campaign, including several conspiracy theories about Hillary Clinton. The ex-Orange Order member, who along with his family is based in Northern Ireland but spends considerable time running the rightwing agency in eastern Europe, claims his networks have a global reach of 50 million online viewers, 17 million of whom live in Britain.
A one-time prominent protester against restrictions on flying the union flag over Belfast City Hall, Dowson was unapologetic about his 180-degree turn on the union between Scotland and the rest of the UK. “I have been a fanatical defender of the union, but I am a pragmatist, and England is finished. It is not just finished because of the Muslim problem and immigration, but also because as of now we are looking at permanent Tory rule. There is no effective opposition to the Tories, so what do you want then – permanent Conservative rule for the next 30 years?”
He defended himself against potential charges from fellow loyalists both in Northern Ireland and Scotland of becoming an ally of the SNP. “The thing is, if you want to kill off the SNP, then have independence. It would be just like Ukip after Brexit, as there would be no need any more for an SNP once there was independence.”
Dowson said he would be “co-ordinating a vast network of patriotic networks just like the ones that backed Trump and Brexit” to promote a pro-independence vote if and when a referendum was called.
A one-time member of the far-right Britain First organisation, which he resigned from three years ago, Dowson said he would be directing the pro-independence online media campaign from his bases in Hungary and Serbia as well as in Britain, including from an office in Stirling.
“This is a global network that I believed helped elect Donald Trump and backed Brexit to win. The SNP will hate it that I am involved, but I am not interested in what the SNP say. I think that if people are on these sites and realise that someone like me has changed my mind, then pro-union voters in Scotland might change their minds too.”
I have been a fanatical defender of the union, but I am a pragmatist, and England is finished
He continued: “That’s my job – to stir the pot! I have been fanatically pro-union all my life, but things have changed, and we can reach a situation where Scotland will be separate but still be friends with an independent England.”
Asked what Ulster loyalists would say about his U-turn on Scottish independence, Dowson told the Guardian he believed the long-term future of Northern Ireland may lie in a “federal Ireland”. “I know there is greater pain and hurt amongst the unionist-loyalist community, but we loyalists need to embrace change. There is no point in shouting ‘No surrender’ for the next 20 years and then waking up within the next two decades to a Catholic-Nationalist majority that will just force us into a United Ireland.
“Perhaps the way forward is federalism, with unionists having some autonomy and control in a new Ireland. Ulster is changing and the demographics show there will be a Catholic majority. Some of the most militant Ulster loyalists I know get this, even while what you would call cultural unionists do not.”
An unapologetic advocate of Christian nationalist anti-immigrant groups across Europe, the 52-year-old former evangelical preacher is also a strong proponent of Vladimir Putin. Dowson has spoken at a conference of far-right leaders in Russia and wants Trump to enter an era of cooperation with Putin.
On the role of the “alt-right” websites he controlled in the US elections, Dowson said he was spreading “devastating anti-Clinton, pro-Trump memes and soundbites into sections of the population too disillusioned with politics to have taken any notice of conventional campaigning”.
Anti-racist organisation Hope Not Hate said: “Dowson has become a major player in social media, using his ‘hub’ in Budapest to spew out hatred right around the world. His proposed intervention in Scotland has nothing to do with independence, but with everything to do with the lust for bigotry and making another of his former places of residence a battleground for hatred.”
- This article was amended on 21 March 2017 to correct the spelling of Stirling.