Fox News has signed Steve Hilton, David Cameron’s former head of strategy, as a contributor on politics and technology.
Hilton was an adviser to Cameron before quitting in 2012, having fallen out with Tory colleagues after taking on the role of enforcer. The spin doctor character Stewart Pearson in The Thick of It is said to have been a send-up of him.
He is currently the chief executive of the startup Crowdpac, which aims to match people to politicians and ideologies, and also teaches at Stanford University’s Institute of Design.
Fox said Hilton would offer “political and tech expertise and analysis” across the Fox News channel and the Fox Business Network.
Hilton was an early proponent of the UK leaving the EU and was vocal in the run-up to the referendum, saying last May that being a member made the UK “ungovernable”.
He backed Donald Trump over Hilary Clinton for the US presidency, writing for Fox in November that “rich coastal elites” supported Clinton because they were not as concerned about growing the US economy.
He wrote: “You don’t have to agree with everything Donald Trump says or does to conclude that he would make the most positive, practical difference in the real lives of real people.”
Hilton is married to Rachel Whetstone, the former political secretary to the Conservative leader Michael Howard who is now Uber’s senior vice-president of policy and communications, and who was previously head of communications for Google.
