Reform MP allegedly called Kenyon a ‘sh*t candidate’

According to one Labour politician, a Reform MP said the following about Makerfield candidate Rob Kenyon:

Chatting to a loose lipped Reform MP today who tells me that they've given up on Makerfield.

"An absolute sh*t candidate and no real understanding of how to tackle a by-election".

— Mike Reader MP (@mike_reader) June 13, 2026

On the one hand, Mike Reader would have every reason to lie about this. On the other, Reform MPs would have every reason to call Kenyon a “sh*t candidate”, because he is.

“No real understanding”

What is it that makes Kenyon such a bad candidate?

Firstly, there are the many controversial statements he’s made in the past that he’s refused to apologise for. As Reform Party UK Exposed summarised:

Rob Kenyon has still not apologised for his homophobic or sexist comments.#Makerfield pic.twitter.com/zg91qJf7eT

— Reform Party UK Exposed 🇬🇧 (@reformexposed) June 9, 2026

When they say he’s a “sexist”, they say that because Kenyon referred to himself as a “sexist”. He also speculated that:

the majority [of abortions] are for vanity purposes like unwanted pregnancies.

The second problem Kenyon has is that he’s not very good at speaking about or even understanding Reform’s policies:

This might be the worst performance from a political candidate I have ever seen in my life. pic.twitter.com/Kku1RecFJ0

— Ali Milani (@AliMilaniUK) June 2, 2026

This is a problem, because the worse your policies are, the better you need to be at selling them.

The third problem for Kenyon is that he seems to be clueless in general:

Hi @RobKenyonReform, Ashton Library was already saved thanks to the Labour MP Josh Simons (you might of heard of him) and Councillors.

Being that you’ve not bothered to even sign the paperwork for being a councillor, let alone attending your first meeting, it’s no surprise you… pic.twitter.com/kHFkM7zaNi

— Reform Party UK Exposed 🇬🇧 (@reformexposed) June 2, 2026

Hands and knees

Kenyon’s sexism seems to be a particular problem for voters. As it turns out, many women don’t want to vote for a guy who is prejudiced against women. And in an attempt to counter that, Reform is now begging female voters to get behind Mr Patriarchy:

An important letter to the women of Makerfield. ⬇️ pic.twitter.com/F9ohFne2uT

— Sarah Pochin MP (@SarahForRuncorn) June 13, 2026

Pochin’s post has provided an opportunity to share more of Kenyon’s past comments:

These are the statements you would get if you asked Chat GPT: ‘please provide the top 5 misogynistic comments spoken by dull men who have nothing to offer besides repeating the comments of other dull men‘. His opinions are so stereotypical, in fact, that it reads like he’s playing sexism bingo.

In the final push for Makerfield, Kenyon has also given voters new reasons to suspect him of sexism. Here he is with his “hero” Ant Middleton:

Great to have the endorsement of one of my heroes @antmiddleton pic.twitter.com/zoEq5gU90c

— Cllr Rob Kenyon (@RobKenyonReform) June 12, 2026

This is besides the point, but if you’re a 40-year-old man, your hero shouldn’t be another 40-year-old man; it should be someone you grew up admiring like Keanu Reeves or Mr Motivator.

Middleton is famous for spreading online misinformation — either on purpose or because he’s easily fooled:

Ant Middleton, who wants to be the next mayor of London, shared this AI slops. It's incredible how thick he is. pic.twitter.com/SKguHZy4xw

— Mukhtar (@I_amMukhtar) December 5, 2025

Ant Middleton is spreading misinformation and claimed that a church in Yorkshire was attacked.

What actually happened is that, during marches held in March in Mexico to mark International Women’s Day, three churches were vandalised because protesters opposed the Catholic…

— Mukhtar (@I_amMukhtar) May 20, 2026

To be fair to him, he has also spread facts; the problem is they were facts he wasn’t supposed to be spreading:

The Ministry of Defence is suing Ant Middleton for spilling secrets about the special forces on a series of social media posts. pic.twitter.com/N8JVqYGszY

— Mukhtar (@I_amMukhtar) October 10, 2025

The reason we’re bringing up Middleton in a conversation about sexism is because of his conviction for assaulting a female police officer:

.@UKLabour I would STRONGLY suggest that you remove this post immediately as your statement of myself ‘assaulting’ a female officer is highly misleading and completely false as I’ve never laid a finger on a woman let alone a female Police officer! However doesn’t Labour allow for… https://t.co/FVp4j9MHkZ

— Ant Middleton (@antmiddleton) June 12, 2026

Providing further context on the above, retired solicitor Clive Wismayer explained:

Learn some law. Common assault does not require contact. As I just saved you about £200,000 I’ll invoice you for half.

Also, I read that you later secured employment without disclosing your criminal convictions. If true, you may have committed the offence of obtaining a pecuniary advantage by deception. I suggest you surrender to the police & make a full confession. I’m only charging fifty quid for that.

Providing more detail on common assault, the Sentencing Council wrote:

A person is guilty of common assault if they either inflict violence on another person – however slight this might be – or make that person think they are about to be attacked.

They do not have to be physically violent – for example, threatening words or a raised fist could lead the victim to believe they are going to be attacked – and that is enough for the crime to have been committed. Other acts like spitting at someone may also classed as common assault.

So Middleton may not have ‘lain a finger’ on a female police officer, but he did do something akin to the above, and this was considered ‘assault’.