A controversial data marketing firm appeared to propose raising money from Brexit-supporting foreign donors on behalf of the Leave.EU campaign, in breach of UK election law.

Cambridge Analytica told the group fronted by Nigel Farage and Arron Banks they could target wealthy people from the US, Canada and Australia on behalf of the pro-Brexit campaign in November 2015, according to a pitch document released by a committee of MPs on Thursday.

Under the heading Target Fundraising, Cambridge Analytica told Leave.EU it could “design and execute a programme of donor solicitation amongst those individuals interested in Britain’s EU status. These could include corporate and individual targets in the United States, UK or other Commonwealth countries”.

Political parties and campaigns are only allowed to accept donations from British individuals, companies or other corporate bodies under election law. In any event, the suggestion was not taken up because Leave.EU did not end up employing Cambridge Analytica, a British company partly owned by rightwing US billionaire Robert Mercer and which worked on Donald Trump’s election campaign.



The pitch document was supplied by Banks, the Leave.EU organiser and principal backer, at the request of the digital, culture, media and sport select committee. Banks was seeking to rebut claims made by Alexander Nix, the chief executive of Cambridge Analytica, who gave evidence to the committee last month.

Nix had told the committee that Cambridge Analytica “did not work with” Leave.EU on the Brexit campaign. At the time, Banks denied that, tweeting the two organisations had negotiated about working together before falling out.

CA wanted a fee of £1m to start work & then said they would raise £6m in the states. We declined the offer because it was illegal. https://t.co/SOcyA8UsUZ — Arron Banks (@Arron_banks) February 27, 2018

Those figures do not appear in the pitch document, although it sets out that Cambridge Analytica would also provide “big data solutions for the EU referendum” as well as help with fundraising.

The company boasted it could “use vast amounts of data including consumer histories, lifestyle information, census returns and historical voting records to construct advanced profiles of individual voters”. It would then apply “psychological analysis” to identify potential Brexit supporting voters.

Banks said that the proposals were contingent on Leave.EU being officially designated as the pro-Brexit campaign group by the Electoral Commission. Vote Leave was selected instead in April 2016 and Banks said all Leave.EU’s dealings with Cambridge Analytica therefore amounted to “tender discussions, negotiations regarding contract terms contingent upon winning designation”. He said Leave.EU did not pay for or receive any pro bono work from Cambridge Analytica.