The Brexit referendum and the political attitudes of immigrants in the UK

The referendum on the UK’s membership in the European Union was one of the most momentous events in British politics since the start of the century, with British voters’ concerns about immigration considered the main driver behind its outcome. In this paper, I use data from the UK Household Longitudinal Study to investigate the impact of the referendum on the political engagement of EU immigrants in the UK by analysing individual level changes in expressed political interest and party support before and after the referendum in a multinomial model. The paper contributes to the continually expanding academic literature on the political behaviour of immigrants and minorities, focussing on the previously under-researched group of European immigrants in the UK. The paper explores on the one hand their level of political interest and political affiliation before the referendum, as well as how their political interest and orientation changed after the vote in comparison to other groups. The results suggest that, although they showed significantly lower levels of interest in politics than the white British majority before the referendum, political interest among EU immigrants significantly increased after the referendum compared to the majority, but also did so among other minority groups, with citizenship status playing an important role. Moreover, EU immigrants were significantly more likely to switch political support to the Liberal Democrats after the referendum than either the white majority or any other minority group, reflecting the party's pro-EU stance.