Daily Mail·United Kingdom·Friday, November 6, 2026 at 02:05 AM UTC

From Burnham to Miliband, how the Left prostrated themselves before Brand the seedy Messiah

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Claire Ellicott Whitehall

His openly misogynistic behaviour, detailed at length in his own memoir, did not deter the Left's most prominent figures from cosying up to Russell Brand.

Nor did the infamous 2008 'Sachsgate' scandal in which Brand, on his BBC Radio 2 show, left voicemails for Fawlty Towers actor Andrew Sachs, boasting of how he had slept with Sachs's granddaughter.

Instead, from the likes of Andy Burnham to Ed Miliband, the now-convicted rapist was lauded for his anti-Tory and anti-establishment image that made him a darling of the Left.

In 2014, Mr Burnham, then shadow health secretary, tweeted his support for Brand and praised him for using his celebrity status 'to help others'.

The then-Labour leader Mr Miliband also courted Brand's support ahead of the 2015 election, being interviewed by the comedian in his £2million penthouse.

The Guardian, meanwhile, asked: 'Could Russell Brand win it for Labour?', while their columnist Owen Jones wrote that 'Russell Brand matters'.

Brand's 2007 memoir, My Booky Wook, in which he described writing a 'victims list' of women he had 'wronged as a result of my sexual addiction', was serialised in The Guardian.

After The Sun newspaper accused the actor and comedian of 'hypocrisy' over his housing arrangements in 2014, Mr Burnham jumped to his defence.

The paper had claimed that he was renting a luxury London home through a British Virgin Islands-registered company while criticising tax avoidance. Brand threatened to sue but never did.

Pictured: Russell Brand interviewing then-Labour leader Ed Miliband shortly before the 2015 general election

Mr Miliband also courted Brand's support ahead of the 2015 election, being interviewed by the comedian in his £2million penthouse

Miliband outside Brand's London house in 2015

Mr Burnham tweeted that day: 'Depressing to see media mission to discredit someone who stops playing their game and uses celebrity to help others. Keep going @rustyrockets [Brand's Twitter handle].'

The now-PM also praised a piece written by Brand for The Guardian about Margaret Thatcher, in which he said: 'I always felt sorry for her children.'

The piece caused outcry at the time and is still on the paper's website. Despite this, Mr Burnham posted a link to the article in 2013, describing it as the 'best thing ever written by a West Ham fan'.

On Thursday night, Labour sources pointed out that Mr Burnham's comments were from more than a decade before Brand's conviction.

Brand's interview with Mr Miliband during the 2015 general election campaign constituted one of the most extraordinary political courtships.

Following the embarrassing 'EdStone' of election pledges, and with postal votes not going his way, Mr Miliband agreed to appear on Brand's YouTube channel in a bid to appeal to the 'yoof'.

At the time it was known he had been charged with, but not convicted of, indecent exposure early in his career, dressed as Osama bin Laden the day after 9/11 and was sacked for reading porn live on the radio.

He had also previously been condemned by then-PM Gordon Brown following 'Sachsgate'.

We speak to the detective who brought down Russell Brand

Hi, I'm Alex Matthews, Editor of The Crime Desk.

Russell Brand has been found guilty of rape and three sexual assaults - and our reporters Caroline Cheetham and Liz Hull were in court every day to witness it all. They sat down with Detective Inspector Laura Nelson who revealed why the women who accused him in the infamous documentary were not involved in his rape trial.

Subscribe to The Crime Desk to listen to the podcast.

Yet the interview was arranged by Mr Miliband's then-chief of staff, Lucy Powell – now Education Secretary – nine days before polling day. Brand was then attempting to present himself as an anti-

capitalist revolutionary, despite living a life of multi-million-pound mansions, private jets, an on-call hair stylist and chauffeur.

Subsequently, Brand endorsed Labour and urged people to vote. Labour went on to have its worst election result since 1987.

However, Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair's former director of communications, congratulated Mr Miliband on the interview.

He said at the time: 'I, for one, was glad when I heard Ed Miliband had said yes... what Russell Brand says and does matters more than what The Sun, the Mail, The Telegraph, the Star and the Express are going to say on election day.'

Mr Miliband considered the interview to have been a success at the time, saying: 'People criticise Russell Brand, and I don't agree with his message, but what he's saying, a number of people are thinking, which is that politics doesn't feel like it speaks to them.'

Brand himself summed it up as 'very interesting… says a lot about Ed Miliband that he understands the way the media works now, the way that the country feels at the moment, that he was prepared to come round here and talk to us'.

He said 'what's important is this bloke will be in Parliament and I think this bloke will listen to us, so on May 7, vote Labour'. At the time, Brand was famously apathetic and said he had never voted.

The Guardian wrote several pieces about the 'Milibrand' interview and asked 'could Russell Brand win it for Labour?'.

Guardian columnist Mr Jones wrote a fawning piece on it, arguing: 'Ed Miliband's best route to young voters is Russell Brand.'

While he noted Brand has 'acknowledged his own problematic attitude towards women', he said Mr Miliband should be 'commended for his bravery' in being interviewed by the comedian.

Mr Jones also wrote: 'Russell Brand has endorsed Labour – and the Tories should be worried,' adding: 'Russell Brand matters.'

Mr Miliband said had he known then what he knows now, he 'wouldn't have done that interview, and I regret doing it'.

Last night, his spokesman declined to comment.

The PM and Mr Miliband were far from the only Left-wing supporters of Brand.

Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Bryant posted a fawning tweet in 2013 saying Brand had 'shone with intelligence on TV last night'.

Former minister Jess Phillips – who campaigns for women's rights – posted that same year: 'Tried to join @rustyrockets revolution, am waiting to hear.'

Former Tory Cabinet minister Gavin Williamson said: 'Sachsgate was no secret. Everyone knew who Russell Brand was, yet Labour's great and good queued up to be photographed with him.

'Miliband wanted the clicks, Burnham wanted the cheers, and nobody wanted to ask the obvious question. Judgment matters in politics, and Labour's has been found wanting yet again.'

Former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith said: 'Russell Brand spoke arrant nonsense, yet too many played up to his media profile and sought publicity by involving themselves in his notorious attitudes and extreme comments.

'They did this while ignoring much of the commentary on his erratic and abusive behaviour.'

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