Nigel Farage is set to discuss the imprisonment of Lucy Connolly at a hearing in US Congress next month.
The mother was behind bars for more than a year after admitting making the inflammatory post on X in the wake of the Southport attacks in July last year.
Connolly pleaded guilty to a charge of inciting racial hatred and was handed a 31-month sentence in October, having been held on remand following her arrest last August.
The Reform UK leader is due to testify to member of Congress in Washington about threats to freedom of speech and expression in the UK, The Telegraph reported.
Farage said the situation surrounding ‘political prisoner’ Connolly will be a ‘central point of what I’m discussing’.
It comes in the wake of a report by the US State department which found ‘serious restrictions on freedom of expression’ in Britain.
The report pointed to laws establishing ‘safe access zones’ around abortion clinics in England and Wales.
‘These restrictions on freedom of speech could include prohibitions on efforts to influence others when inside a restricted area, even through prayer or silent protests,’ it said.
The State Department also highlighted last summer’s Southport murders, in which three young girls were stabbed to death.
The report said, following the attacks, that ‘local and national government officials repeatedly intervened to chill speech as to the identity and motives of the attacker’.
‘Numerous non-government organisations and media outlets criticised the Government’s approach to censoring speech, both in principle and in the perceived weaponisation of law enforcement against political views disfavoured by authorities,’ it added.
‘While many media observers deemed ‘two-tier’ enforcement of these laws following the Southport attacks an especially grievous example of Government censorship, censorship of ordinary Britons was increasingly routine, often targeted at political speech.’
Connolly herself was jailed in the wake of the Southport riots after she wrote a post on X (formerly Twitter) calling for people to set fire to hotels housing asylum seekers.
The post, which she later deleted, said: ‘Mass deportation now, set fire to all the f****** hotels full of the b******* for all I care… if that makes me racist so be it.’
Farage will travel to Washington in early September to give evidence to the House Judiciary Committe at the Capitol.
Mrs Connolly will not be able to join him as her licence prevents her from travelling abroad without permission.
Republican congressman Jim Jordan is the chair of the committee which also has numerous Trump allies as members.
Last week, three of its members, including Mr Jordan, said they had been ‘shocked’ after leading a recent delegation to the UK.
They claimed that European leaders, including Sir Keir Starmer, had begun ‘censoring critics of their failing policies’.
Connolly had been serving time at HMP Peterborough and had an application to have her sentence reduced rejected in May.
But on Wednesday, the 42-year-old was freed after months of pressure from campaigners, allowing her to reunite with her husband and 12-year-old daughter.
The former childminder was driven away from prison in a taxi, hours after it was first revealed by the Daily Mail that she would be released.
The former childminder has been held at the 1,200-inmate prison, on an industrial estate north of the town centre, since mid-June. Previously she was at HMP Drake Hall in Staffordshire.
Her husband and Conservative councillor Ray Connolly told the Daily Mail: ‘It will be good to have her home!’
Ray, who was busy watering hanging baskets in the couple’s front garden to ensure that her homecoming was picture perfect, said their family’s focus from now would be ‘to get our lives back on track.’
He said that both he and Lucy had coped with her imprisonment ‘relatively well’.
But he added: ‘The only person who hasn’t is our 12-year-old daughter. She has found it very difficult not having her mum at home.
‘So well done Keir Starmer for making it so difficult for a 12–year-old girl. Let’s give him a pat on the back.’
This was a reference to the Prime Minister being seen as the epitome of the legal system that he came from and then headed the Crown Prosecution Service – which supporters of Lucy Connolly believe has treated her unfairly.
Connolly’s X post was made just hours after killer Axel Rudakubana murdered three young girls and attempted to murder ten others at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class on July 29, 2024, sparking nationwide unrest.
It came amid speculation, which was later proved to be false, that the murders had been committed by an illegal immigrant.
She was arrested on August 6, by which point she had deleted her social media account.
But other messages which included other damning remarks were uncovered by officers who seized her phone.
The Southport atrocity sparked nationwide unrest, with several people – including Connolly – jailed as a result.
Her tweet was viewed 310,000 times in three-and-a-half hours before she deleted it.
She later pleaded guilty to distributing material with the intention of stirring up racial hatred at Birmingham Crown Court and was sentenced to 31 months in prison in October.
In May, she had an appeal against her sentence refused by three Court of Appeal judges at the Royal Courts of Justice.
Connolly argued she had been ‘really angry’ after the Southport attacks, but hours after posting the rant on X realised it was not an acceptable thing to say, so deleted it.
She also said that news of the Southport murders had triggered her anxiety from when her baby son, Harry, died as the result of a hospital blunder 13 years earlier.
At her appeal case, Adam King, representing Connolly, asked if she had intended for anyone to set fire to asylum hotels or ‘murder any politicians’. She replied: ‘Absolutely not.’
Naeem Valli, for the prosecution, told the court the post was a reflection of her attitude towards immigrants.
At the time Mr Connolly told of the pain of his wife’s long imprisonment, saying: ‘The 284 days of separation have been very hard, particularly on our 12-year-old girl.’
Connolly’s case later became international news, with US officials saying earlier this year they are keeping tabs on developments over their ‘concerns’ about free speech.
A State Department spokesman said in May: ‘We can confirm that we are monitoring this matter. The United States supports freedom of expression at home and abroad, and remains concerned about infringements on freedom of expression.’
It later said the UK Government ‘effectively’ enforced laws around freedom of association and the rights of workers.
It concluded: ‘The human rights situation worsened in the United Kingdom during the year.
‘Significant human rights issues included credible reports of serious restrictions on freedom of expression, including enforcement of or threat of criminal or civil laws in order to limit expression; and crimes, violence, or threats of violence motivated by antisemitism.
‘The Government sometimes took credible steps to identify and punish officials who committed human rights abuses, but prosecution and punishment for such abuses was inconsistent.’
A UK Government spokesperson said: ‘Free speech is vital for democracy around the world, including here in the UK and we are proud to uphold freedoms whilst keeping our citizens safe.’
The assessment echoed sentiments previously expressed by US vice president JD Vance.
In February, Mr Vance criticised the UK over a legal case in which a former serviceman who silently prayed outside an abortion clinic was convicted of breaching the safe zone around the centre.
In a wider attack on what he suggested was a shift away from democratic values across Europe, Mr Vance claimed the ‘basic liberties of religious Britons, in particular’ are under threat.
Speaking at the Munich Security Conference, Mr Vance said that the US’ ‘very dear friends the United Kingdom’ appeared to have seen a ‘backslide in conscience rights’.
Mr Vance said: ‘A little over two years ago, the British government charged Adam Smith-Connor, a 51-year-old physiotherapist and an Army veteran, with the heinous crime of standing 50 metres from an abortion clinic and silently praying for three minutes, not obstructing anyone, not interacting with anyone, just silently praying on his own.
‘After British law enforcement spotted him and demanded to know what he was praying for, Adam replied simply it was on behalf of the unborn son he and his former girlfriend had aborted years before.
‘Now, the officers were not moved – Adam was found guilty of (breaking) the Government’s new buffer zones law, which criminalises silent prayer and other actions that could influence a person’s decision within 200 metres of abortion facility.
‘He was sentenced to pay thousands of pounds in legal costs to the prosecution… In Britain and across Europe, free speech, I fear, is in retreat.’