How we got here
Valance had been largely off the radar in Australia since a pretty forgettable attempt to crack into Hollywood in the early 2000s. She married Candy in Beverly Hills in 2012 and the couple have two children.
Valance and her husband,Nick Candy (left),with former US president Donald Trump and conservative British politician Nigel Farage at Mar-a-Lago.Credit:Twitter
Then in 2022,she made headlines when a photo shared by Farage on what was then called Twitter,showed her,Candy and Farage posing with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida. She later described Trump as “extremely warm,extremely gentlemanly”.
More recently she’s been doing interviews in the British media,particularly on the right-leaning GB News.
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She told the talk station in February,“I would say that everyone starts off as a leftie,then wakes up at some point,after you start either making money,working,trying to run a business,trying to buy a home,and then you realise what crap ideas they all are. And then you go to the right.”
In follow-up appearances on the network,she’s gone on to dismiss climate change as a crisis saying “the air is better than when I was growing up”,called Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg a “demonic little gremlin” and has spoken out about how Australia has become a nanny state.
“I’ll get a ticket within the first two hours of arriving,doing something,parking in the wrong place,going one[km/h] over the 30 or 25[km/h] speed limit,” she said.
“The Australia I grew up in was unreal. It was so fun,and we didn’t seem to have all these problems. The woke stuff’s really gone big in Australia.”
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Her media profile has established her as an influential figure on Britain’s right and she is considered a close friend,and confidant,of Farage. She recently claimed credit forconvincing him to runin next month’s British election,telling GB News she had been “whispering in his ear for a long time,saying,‘Come on,pull your finger out,give the people what they want.’ ”
What they said?
Asked as guests left why she had chosen to host the event,Valance said,“Because if America is doing well,we are all doing well.”
Trump Jr described the event as “incredible” and said he was excited to “see my friends in London,who are all ready to make America great again”.
The Times,however,reported that Valance’s “well-heeled neighbours” were not overly impressed by the event. One woman shouted “Vote Biden” as guests arrived.
For Democrat supporters,there was another option. At the same time as the Valance soiree,Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour hosted a fundraiser in London supporting US President Joe Biden’s campaign. Tickets to that event cost $US1000.
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