British Politician Rory Stewart slammed for 'weirdly' staring at guest on talkshow

A UK politician has gone viral online after an awkward stare down with a female journalist was caught live on TV.

There’s a lot to be said about which clips social media users choose to make viral.

From animal clips, to funny fails, or even a pop culture meme or two.

However, it’s not often a politician gets their attention these days (unless it’s Donald Trump), and certainly not one from the UK.

However, there has been a special spot reserved for former Member of Parliament Rory Stewart after his bizarre time on BBC’s Newsnight was released to the public.

Thanks to one moment during a discussion on artificial intelligence, people online were left creeped out when Stewart turned suddenly to intently stare at New Statesman political editor Ailbhe Rea as she answered a panel question.

From there, the rest was left for social media to talk about. And talk they did.

Someone said: "If someone did that to me in a formal conversation I'd just burst out laughing. How did she [Rea] manage to keep a straight face?"

Stewart had been asked about King Charles III's private AI summit, where he warned that UK’s dependence on the US and Chinese AI was ‘terrifying’.

After he answered, Stewart turned to Rea as she answered her own question on the topic, and the politician stared for a few seconds before suddenly sitting back and reaching for his mug in front of him.

The moment has since left people confused by the interaction, leading to speculation over the cause.

Even J.K Rowling joked on X over the moment: “Someone whispered to him right before the show started, ‘remember to look interested when the woman’s talking, Rory.’”

Someone else said: “Rory Stewart has always been a bit weird. No change here.”

Another wrote: “lol. It has to be AI. There is no way he's that weird.”

A fourth added: “Why is he always so awkward? He’s like an alien pretending to be a human and failing.”

Then a commenter warned others: “Fellow men: do not try this on a first date.”

Before his stare, he warned against the continued use of US and Chinese-run AI software in the UK, telling the panel: "The big question around what the U.K. does — on a global level the U.S. and China must begin to get regulation in place for safety on AI.

"These things could be phenomenally dangerous, but it's the U.S. and China who are driving the frontier labs.

"Then the question is Britain, and how we protect ourselves from being completely dependent on the U.S. and China if we build all of our military, all of our hospitals, all of our businesses on American and Chinese AI, and they have the kill-switch, and all the value goes to them? It's terrifying."

After Stewart’s star did its rounds online, the presenter of the show, Matt Chorley told the Guardian: “I didn’t notice Rory looking particularly intently at anyone during the course of the programme.”

“You know a moment from Newsnight has cut through when friends and family who don’t normally watch it are suddenly sending me clips,” he said. “But it is just quite a funny moment.”

He went on to joke that he had told the panelists before filming: “Anything that can be used to go viral, maybe a punchup or whatever, a tiff at the table, if you want to do that, that’d be great.”

However, he said it was likely just the angles making things look strange.

“It’s not the first time that something he’s done has gone wild online. I think he was genuinely probably just intently listening to what Ailbhe had to say. But there was something about the camera angle and his very direct look,” he said.

As for Rae, she took to X to also talk about the star, joking that she’d ‘please like attention levels like this on my latest interview’.