A close adviser to Nigel Farage had an influential role at a national polling company despite not being publicly associated with the firm, the Guardian can reveal. Chris Bruni-Lowe, Farage’s private pollster for many years, played an important role in the operations of Redfield & Wilton Strategies and used it to develop potential campaign strategies, according to several sources who have worked there. The firm, founded in 2020, is owned by Bruno Rodrigues, a lawyer.
Its main public face was Philip van Scheltinga, a Harvard graduate. As the Covid pandemic grew and the UK entered lockdown, the company’s polls received increasing coverage, even while the source of the firm’s polling expertise was unclear. Former employees have now revealed the important role of Bruni-Lowe, who sometimes went by the name “Chris Redfield”, under which quotes were published by the Washington Post newspaper.
As well as ordering UK and US voter intention polls, sources said Bruni-Lowe directed research on issues such as council spending, and appeared “obsessed” with producing a dossier which he suggested could be sold to political parties. Bruni-Lowe’s role at the company will amplify questions about transparency in the polling industry, given his longstanding association with Farage at a time of intense scrutiny over the party’s use of polls to shape its political narrative. The rules of the British Polling Council do not require pollsters to state any political affiliations, but they have strict guidelines on how they must declare who has commissioned and paid for any polling.
In a statement, Rodrigues, the company’s sole director, said there had never been “an institutional, polling, research, commissioning or financial relationship” between Redfield & Wilton and Reform UK or Farage. He said Bruni-Lowe had worked as a “consultant” from mid-2020 until late 2022, and returned “voluntarily” in the summer of 2025 to train interns. Rodrigues added that Bruni-Lowe was “an important and highly valued member” of the team.
Sources said Bruni-Lowe, who some employees said had been known as “Chris Redfield”, was heavily involved in the company’s polling operations. Rodrigues said the surname Redfield was used as an email account convention within the organisation, citing other examples of “Philip Redfield” and “Bruno Redfield”. He said: “It was not a device created specifically for Chris and it did not conceal his identity from people working within the company.” Nonetheless, the situation was confusing enough that at least one newspaper, the Washington Post, attributed quotes to that name, while notes taken by one former employee during an oral induction in the summer of 2021, and seen by the Guardian, described “boss – Chris Redfield is COO essentially”.
Rodrigues said: “He was never presented to staff as the company’s chief operating officer and staff were never instructed to treat him as such.” He added that Van Scheltinga, as director of research, led the “day-to-day operation”. The Guardian can also reveal that Dan Jukes, then a senior adviser to Farage, sought to promote Redfield & Wilton’s work in 2020, looking to place exclusive polls in publications including the Guardian, which turned down the offer. Jukes stepped down as Farage’s chief of staff recently over a scandal in which undercover reporters posed as potential overseas donors to Reform UK.
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