NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Why are thousands of European Muslims flocking to radical Islam? According to UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage, “state sponsored multiculturalism” deserves much of the blame for why extremism has found a home in Europe.

“We [the U.K.] have pursued a policy for nearly four decades now of multiculturalism,” Farage told The Daily Caller Thursday. “We have encouraged division. Rather than having different communities coming together, under one law, we have encouraged division.”

“That policy I think has been a dramatic failure,” the Member of European Parliament (MEP) added.

Farage, one of the featured speakers at the Conservative Political Action Conference this week, pointed out that multiculturalism is not only encouraging the growth of Islamic extremism, it’s also “turning a blind eye” towards certain communities enforcing Sharia law and horrific crimes like the Rotherham sex scandal.

That scandal involved five Pakistani men running a “grooming” ring that forced girls as young as 12 into sex slavery. Despite the men victimizing nearly 1,500 girls and social workers continually alerting authorities to the problem over several years, local officials in Rotherham decided to not take action — all because they didn’t want to look “racist.”

“It appears that right through Rotherham at every level of authority the idea was that if you were to pursue these people you might be called racist and that’s terrible. So better not be called racist and allow this wholesale abuse to continue. That was just wrong. In fact, it’s actually one of the most appalling things I’ve seen in my lifetime in Britain,” Farage explained.

But the rising political star is hopeful that more people in his country are becoming aware of the problem, but it’s now the government’s job to do its part to stop the radicalization within its borders.

“I still don’t feel our government is being strong enough in defending our Judeo-Christian principles, and that’s what we have to do,” Farage declared. “We must assert who we are. What our culture is. What our beliefs are.”

“We have to arm out intelligent services to a level where we hope they can stop homegrown terror,” he continued. “And… we have to stop preachers of hate coming into Britain — funded by certain Middle Eastern countries — spreading a doctrine that if you or I were to spread we’d find ourselves locked up pretty quickly.”

According to Farage, British politics is witnessing a massive change in elections due to many voters no longer casting their ballots based purely on economic concerns.

“This is the first time since 1945 where the economy alone will not determine who wins the general election. There are deeper concerns about communities, about culture, about a massive change that is being seen not just in the big cities, but that is spread out through the market towns and villages across a very, very substantial part of our country and people are saying, ‘We’re worse off financially than we were 10 years ago,'” he stated.

In the UKIP chairman’s opinion, many Britons feel like they’re losing their country.

“We walk into our town center on a Saturday night and we don’t hear English being spoken,” Farage told TheDC. “Why is this happening? I think what I’ve been saying for many, many years that open doors, unrestricted immigration to the whole of southern and eastern Europe would lead to a massive flow of people. We just had the U.K. immigration figures out today showing the highest figure ever. So a lot of people are feeling that we need to get a grip and take control and that matters more directly than what is in their pocket.”

But those in charge of the European Union have a different idea, Farage told TheDC.

“They [EU leaders] think they’re creating a new state. They have a flag, an anthem, a president. They believe that the free movement of peoples is in the central part of that. They believe we’re all Europeans now. Well, I’m afraid you’ve only got to look at the difference between Greece and Germany or Romania and the UK to realize that Europe is made up of very, very different nations. And the attempt to force us all into one, without our consent ever have been given, is actually breeding politically extremism and bad blood,” Farage said.

The MEP’s solution to immigration is for the U.K. to “take back control of its borders from Brussels and we can put in place an Australia-style point system, where we choose the numbers that come and the type of people who come to our country.”

He also has a message for American conservatives and the Republican Party.

“Listen guys, I come from a country where we speak English, where we have a first-pass electoral system, where two parties have dominated parties have dominated politics for hundreds of years and look how that’s changed over the past few years. Don’t think politics are set in stone. Don’t think politics can’t change,” Farage said.

“But if you really want the Republican Party to win the next presidential election, you have to start reaching out to the type of voters who are voting for us back in the UK. The aspirational blue-collar voters. In the old days, they were called the Reagan Democrats, where are they now?”