Police have launched an investigation into £37,500 of donations to Robert Jenrick’s 2024 campaign to become Conservative leader, following a referral from the Electoral Commission. The Metropolitan Police confirmed the inquiry on Wednesday, after the Guardian first revealed in April that officers were assessing evidence relating to the donations.
What the Electoral Commission was investigating
The Electoral Commission had been examining allegations that the £37,500 came from a foreign source, which would breach electoral rules barring overseas companies and individuals from donating to UK politicians or parties. A Met spokesperson said: “We have launched an investigation following a referral from the Electoral Commission on Tuesday 6 January concerning donations connected to a political party’s leadership campaign. The investigation remains ongoing.”
The Guardian’s earlier reporting established that the Electoral Commission received allegations relating to donations made to Jenrick by a UK-based company, The Spott Fitness. It is understood the investigation centres on claims that £37,500 of the £100,000 in donations from that company ultimately originated with US businessman Gary Klopfenstein, via a US company he founded called Innovyz USA.
Jenrick’s response
Jenrick has called the allegations “entirely false,” saying: “It is no surprise that an establishment determined to stop Reform from delivering the change that this country so desperately needs would resort to making these demonstrably untrue claims.” He added: “I have had no contact with the Met police whatsoever in connection with this matter.”
He has previously said his campaign team complied fully with electoral law, and that he had no knowledge of any connection to Klopfenstein or awareness of the alleged link until the Electoral Commission began making inquiries.
A spokesperson for Phillip Ullmann, a UK businessman previously understood to have been the ultimate source of the Spott Fitness donations, declined to comment on the latest development. In April, Ullmann said he had been transparent with Jenrick’s campaign and had voluntarily provided information to the Electoral Commission.
The political context
Jenrick raised the money in 2024 while still a Conservative MP, during what was then a possible leadership run to succeed Rishi Sunak. He has since defected to Reform UK and now serves as Nigel Farage’s Treasury spokesperson, a role that has already seen him repeatedly called upon to defend Farage’s own finances across multiple difficult broadcast appearances in recent weeks.
Conservative Party chairman Kevin Hollinrake welcomed the police referral: “The Electoral Commission rightly referred this matter to the Metropolitan Police who are now investigating. The public deserves the truth about this donation.”
Why the timing is especially awkward for Reform
The revelation lands at a period of intense financial scrutiny for Reform’s senior leadership more broadly. Farage remains under formal Parliamentary Standards investigation over an undeclared £5m gift from crypto billionaire Christopher Harborne, a gift that has reportedly triggered a suspicious activity report with the National Crime Agency over concerns about the ultimate origin of the funds. The Sunday Times has separately reported that Farage failed to declare years of financial support from George Cottrell, a convicted fraudster. Richard Tice has accused the NCA of leaking his own company’s bank statements to the Guardian after reporting linked a loan from his firm to Cottrell.
Now Jenrick, the party’s Treasury spokesperson and one of the figures most frequently sent out to defend Farage’s finances in broadcast interviews, faces a formal police investigation into his own campaign donations. The pattern across all four cases is broadly similar: allegations concerning the true origin of significant sums of money connected to senior Reform figures, met with denials, and now, in Jenrick’s case, an active Metropolitan Police inquiry rather than solely a regulatory or parliamentary process.
The scale of the scrutiny now facing Reform’s senior team
Taken together, the party’s most senior figures are currently managing an extraordinary simultaneous set of financial investigations: two separate Parliamentary Standards inquiries into Farage, a National Crime Agency suspicious activity report connected to the Harborne gift, Tice’s own leak allegation against the NCA, and now a Metropolitan Police investigation into Jenrick’s leadership campaign funding. This comes in the same week Farage resigned his Clacton seat to trigger a self-styled “people versus the establishment” byelection, a framing that multiple broadcasters and opposition politicians have already directly challenged given the scale and nature of the financial questions now surrounding the party’s leadership.
What happens next
The Metropolitan Police investigation remains ongoing, with the exact scope unclear and officers not having confirmed whether the inquiry relates to any specific individual beyond the general question of the donations’ origin. Whether the investigation ultimately results in any formal findings against Jenrick, Klopfenstein, Ullmann or The Spott Fitness remains to be determined, but the referral itself marks a significant escalation from the earlier Electoral Commission assessment to an active criminal inquiry, adding a further, distinct thread to the accumulating financial scrutiny facing Reform’s leadership as a whole.
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Joe Connor is a UK-based reporter specialising in politics, public policy, and national affairs. He has previously contributed to publications including The London Economic (JOE Media Group) and Spotted News.
At The Daily Britain, he covers Westminster politics, elections, and breaking political developments, alongside in-depth analysis of policy decisions and their real-world impact.