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Thom Yorke says Theresa May's use of EU citizens as 'bargaining tool' compares to 'early days of the Third Reich'

Radiohead frontman has been a vocal critic of the prime minister's handling of Brexit

Roisin O'Connor
Music Correspondent
Friday 08 February 2019 07:59 EST
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Thom Yorke has lashed out at Theresa May for the “chaos” and “suffering” she is causing in the UK over Brexit.

The Radiohead frontman posted an impassioned message on Twitter that accused her of facilitating a hostile environment towards refugees, and claimed she is using “the lives of millions of Europeans as a bargaining tool”.

“Nobody voted for you to threaten chaos upon this land in myriad form in order to intimidate its citizens and parliament,”he wrote.

“Nobody voted for you to bring into question the lives of millions of Europeans as a bargaining tool, causing immense distress and suffering, an action worthy of the early days of the Third Reich.”

“Nobody voted for you to drive this red bus over a cliff with the passengers screaming in the back. None of this has been an expression of the democracy you have been claiming to uphold. Fear is not a weapon to be used by a UK Prime Minister in the 21st Century. Stop the bus… now.”

Radiohead are being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in March. Yorke will not attend due to work committments, and told Variety that the band "don't quite understand" what the honour means.

“We don’t want to offend anyone. We just think that we just don’t quite understand it," he said. "We’ve had it explained to us, so it’s cool,” he said. “But we don’t really understand it as English people.

“I think our problem is essentially that every awards ceremony in the UK stinks. We grew up with the Brit [Awards], which is like this sort of drunken car crash that you don’t want to get involved with. So, yeah, we don’t really know what to make of it.”

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