Liam O'Dell
May 09, 2021
Actor and London mayoral candidate Laurence Fox was beaten in this week’s election by YouTube prankster Niko Omilana, and the internet is now reminding him of other things which did better than his campaign to replace Sadiq Khan.
Fox, who founded the Reclaim Party, received just short of 2 percent of first preference votes with 47,634 cast in his favour, but Omilana – self-proclaimed “Supreme Leader” of the Niko Defence League (NDL) – finished with 49,628 votes, placing him fifth in the first round of voting.
Fellow YouTuber Max Fosh, who stood with the sole intention of getting more votes than Fox, finished 19th out of the 20 candidates with 6,309 ballots.
“At least team YouTube beat [Laurence Fox] – I have to thank @NikoOmilana,” Fosh tweeted on Saturday.
Omilana replied: “Happy to help out my friend xx”
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While Omilana was able to beat Fox, Count Binface – a candidate many hoped would surpass the “anti-woke” activist in votes – finished three places behind him, in ninth place.
But, in another blow for Fox, he will also lose his £10,000 deposit, which can only be ‘reclaimed’ if a candidate gets a vote share of more than 5 percent (he got 1.9 percent). The majority of the other candidates will lose theirs too, although clearly many had far less financial support than Fox, who received £5 million in donations when the party was launched in September, according to The Daily Telegraph.
London Mayoral Election: Khan (LAB): 40.0% Bailey (CON): 35.3% Berry (GRN): 7.8% Porritt (LDM): 4.4% Omilana (IND)… https://t.co/NsTUubmHsm— Election Maps UK (@Election Maps UK) 1620516185
Anyway, Omilana’s campaign wasn’t the only thing which was more successful than Fox’s run for Mayor of London, with Twitter users quick to point out and suggest other things which have done better than the Lewis star’s 47,000 figure. They aren’t all *quite* true, but they are very amusing:
Billie Piper sold more copies of Because We Want To in its opening week than Laurence Fox got votes for London Mayor— george griffiths (@george griffiths) 1620512804
Nadia Almada received more votes to win Big Brother than Laurence Fox got in his mayoral bid. https://t.co/2kQ1x24OSv— Liam-James 🐝 (@Liam-James 🐝) 1620515109
There are more Pret A Mangers in London than people who voted for Laurence Fox.— TechnicallyRon (@TechnicallyRon) 1620512278
If the Incredible Hulk & Edward Scissorhands did a flat share they'd still have a higher chance of keeping their deposit than Laurence Fox.— Phlegm Clandango (@Phlegm Clandango) 1620494444
There’s more people in the new Phantom of the Opera orchestra than there were voters for Laurence Fox.— Gerard McCarthy (@Gerard McCarthy) 1620516740
I’ve had more panic attacks in my life than Laurence Fox had votes. #LondonMayoralElection— Eleni Roka (@Eleni Roka) 1620518646
Second fact of the day: More people were suspected of being ‘H’ than voted for Laurence Fox. #Lineofduty— Line of Duty Content (@Line of Duty Content) 1620561876
Others pointed out that despite the large financial backing, press coverage and the endorsement of former Ukip and Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage, his final result was rather anticlimactic. Some feared what Fox would be up to next:
Laurence Fox - endorsed by Farage and Reform Party gets just 1.9% of the vote despite all that buzz and press. https://t.co/GgM9DdTgne— Otto English (@Otto English) 1620512536
So Laurence Fox did get more votes than the guy with the bin on his head, but not as many as the bloke off YouTube… https://t.co/tCEI7Dwnoc— Jack Blanchard (@Jack Blanchard) 1620512733
everything is a binfire but at least there is Laurence Fox cheering us up by losing his deposit— dave ❄️ 🥕 🧻 (@dave ❄️ 🥕 🧻) 1620513338
Mock all you like, but that's a good result for Laurence Fox. He raised a £5m warchest, and got less than 50k votes… https://t.co/cbQo10sgZg— NewsThump (@NewsThump) 1620512460
Lawrence Fox got beaten by a Youtuber who ran on a platform of getting Freddos back to 5p just in case you wonderin… https://t.co/5YkLXMND5W— Jess (@Jess) 1620549891
This is the manifesto that got more votes than Lawrence Fox (with zero mainstream coverage) https://t.co/Rim1QTidjI— Maya Wolfe-Robinson (@Maya Wolfe-Robinson) 1620550173
Actor Lawrence Fox lost his deposit in his attempt to be London Mayor but he’ll still be booked by the BBC to come… https://t.co/VfRI6eCyvd— Ken Holmes #RefugeesWelcome 🖐🖐🏾♥️NHS 🌱⚽️ (@Ken Holmes #RefugeesWelcome 🖐🖐🏾♥️NHS 🌱⚽️) 1620552791
Lawrence Fox didn’t pay for his own deposit. His backer Jeremy Hosking did. And the campaign did what they wanted i… https://t.co/HZhrQcIpck— Mic Wright (@Mic Wright) 1620501594
Looks like the two things left for Fox to reclaim now are his reputation and his dignity.
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