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From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it’s investigating the financials of Elon Musk’s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, ‘The A Word’, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.<\/p>\n
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.<\/p>\n
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.<\/p>\n
Your support makes all the difference.<\/strong><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nRead more<\/span><\/svg><\/span><\/button><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/aside>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\nThe founder of an online movement of young Ed Miliband fans has announced she is engaged to the former Labour leader\u2019s lookalike. <\/p>\n
Abby Tomlinson was 17-years-old when she launched the #Milifandom in the run up to the 2015 general election. She gained thousands of followers at the time and got to meet the politician in the process. <\/p>\n
On Monday (11 August), Tomlinson revealed she is going to marry someone who was once mocked for looking like Miliband.<\/p>\n
She shared the news in a TikTok video soundtracked to the viral Pink Pantheress song \u201cILLEGAL\u201d, which is commonly used on social media in posts detailing examples of unlikely pairings. <\/p>\n
Tomlinson is introduced in the clip as \u201cgirl who went viral for fancying Ed Miliband,\u201d with the video then flipping to her partner, a Miliband lookalike. The caption then reads: \u201cBoy who got made fun of for looking a bit like Ed Miliband.\u201d<\/p>\n
She wrote on the post: \u201cHis first words to me were: \u2018Are you the Milifandom girl?\u2019 Now we\u2019re engaged.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tomlinson\u2019s followers were happy to see her active on social media again, with one person writing: \u201cOh my god. This is the update I did not know I NEEDED in my life. Congrats.\u201d<\/p>\n
Miliband was seen as a nerdy, less charismatic version of his brother David, when he ran for prime minister against David Cameron in 2016. However, he had a last minute revival among young teenage girls who spawned several fan accounts dedicated to him. <\/p>\n
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Ed Miliband\u2019s awkward demeanour spawned an unlikely fandom (Getty Images)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\nHis status as a sex symbol came as a surprise to him, gasping when shown a picture of his face photoshopped onto a topless picture of Poldark, by The Independent<\/em> in 2015. The politician eventually met Tomlinson for lunch, an event she described as \u201cone of the best moments of my life\u201d.<\/p>\nHowever, his wife seemed less inspired by the movement. <\/p>\n
\u201cI said to her, \u2018there\u2019s this thing called the Milifandom,\u2019 and she rolled her eyes, as if to say, \u2018I can\u2019t quite believe it,\u2019\u201d Miliband told the Evening Standard<\/em>. \u201cI think she\u2019s a bit bemused by it, to be honest.\u201d<\/p>\nTomlinson said at the time: \u201cThe tabloids were saying, \u2018He\u2019s weird, he looks funny eating a bacon sandwich.\u2019 They made him out to be the village idiot. It made me really angry.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it’s investigating the financials of Elon Musk’s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, ‘The A Word’, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging. At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story. The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it. Your support makes all the difference. Read more The founder of an online movement of young Ed Miliband fans has announced she is engaged to the former Labour leader\u2019s lookalike. Abby Tomlinson was 17-years-old when she launched the #Milifandom in the run up to the 2015 general election. She gained thousands of followers at the time and got to meet the politician in the process. On Monday (11 August), Tomlinson revealed she is going to marry someone who was once mocked for looking like Miliband. She shared the news in a TikTok video soundtracked to the viral Pink Pantheress song \u201cILLEGAL\u201d, which is commonly used on social media in posts detailing examples of unlikely pairings. Tomlinson is introduced in the clip as \u201cgirl who went viral for fancying Ed Miliband,\u201d with the video then flipping to her partner, a Miliband lookalike. The caption then reads: \u201cBoy who got made fun of for looking a bit like Ed Miliband.\u201d She wrote on the post: \u201cHis first words to me were: \u2018Are you the Milifandom girl?\u2019 Now we\u2019re engaged.\u201d Tomlinson\u2019s followers were happy to see her active o…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4570,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4569"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4569"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4569\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4570"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4569"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4569"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.seekyourlove.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4569"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}