General election: Farage tells PM - Drop Brexit deal or my party stands everywhere
The Brexit Party leader admits there is a "high" risk he will split the Conservative vote at the snap poll on 12 December.
Friday 1 November 2019 18:00, UK
Nigel Farage has invited Boris Johnson to form a "Leave alliance" at the general election - but said is price is the PM dropping his Brexit deal.
He rubbished Mr Johnson for "trying to sell a second-hand motor" and called on him to tear up the new Brexit deal because "nothing has changed - this is Mrs May's appalling surrender treaty".
The Brexit Party leader set a deadline of two weeks - until 14 November - for Mr Johnson to agree, or else he vowed to unleash his candidates in every seat in England, Scotland and Wales.
He claimed to be "in communication with a number of MPs who are prepared to renounce the withdrawal agreement" so there could be "local exceptions" for "friends".
It comes after US President Donald Trump made a bombshell intervention in the election campaign to declare that Mr Farage and Mr Johnson could become an "unstoppable force".
He also warned Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn would be "so bad" for the UK, ahead of the 12 December snap poll.
Mr Farage, launching the Brexit Party's campaign in central London, refused to say if he would personally stand as an MP and which seat he would target.
If a non-aggression pact is struck, he estimated there were around 150 Labour stronghold seats that the Tories will never win for "cultural reasons" where the Brexit Party could clean up.
If not, Mr Farage admitted the chance of splitting the vote was "high" but refused to accept he could be responsible for stopping Brexit by taking votes off the Tories and letting Labour win instead, paving the way to another referendum.
He insisted it was only right to stand against the Conservatives because "we would be the only" true Brexit choice.
But Conservative chair James Cleverly said people who back the Brexit Party will only prolong the deadlock in parliament.
"A vote for Farage risks letting Jeremy Corbyn into Downing Street via the back door - and the country spending 2020 having two referendums on Brexit and Scottish independence," he said.
"It will not get Brexit done - and it will create another gridlocked parliament that doesn't work."
Mr Johnson ruled out any electoral pact with Mr Farage during the Tory leadership contest earlier this year, saying: "I don't think the Conservative Party should do deals with any other parties."
When pressed to could guarantee he would not sign up to one, Mr Johnson said: "Yes, I rule it out."
The Brexit Party was only set up earlier this year to pile pressure on the Conservatives in the run-up to the European Parliament elections, which it won, trailed in second place by the Liberal Democrats.