What was claimed
Sadiq Khan worked for the Nation of Islam.
Our verdict
Correct. He was a solicitor for the group back when he was a human rights lawyer.
Sadiq Khan was a solicitor for the Nation of Islam
23 August 2019
A post which has been shared over 3,000 times on Facebook claims that London Mayor Sadiq Khan worked for the political group Nation of Islam, and includes a screenshot of a TV interview with him which describes him as “Solicitor for the Nation of Islam”.
Sadiq Khan did represent the Nation of Islam in 2001 and 2002. Mr Khan was the group’s solicitor in a legal battle to overturn a ban on its leader, Louis Farrakhan, entering the UK. The ban was overturned, then later reinstated on appeal.
Mr Khan was a human rights lawyer before he first became an MP in 2005. A 2016 article about some of Mr Khan's previous work, including the Nation of Islam case, quoted the Mayor as saying “I have never hidden the fact that I was a human rights lawyer. Unfortunately, that means that I had to speak on behalf of some unsavoury individuals. Some of their views made me feel deeply uncomfortable, but it was my job...
“Even the worst people deserve a legal defence.”