Pressure is mounting on Theresa May to ban the US “pickup artist” Julien Blanc from entering Britain after the Home Office minister Lynne Featherstone and Labour’s Yvette Cooper called for him to be denied a visa.

More than 110,000 people have signed a Change.org petition calling for Blanc to be refused entry after he was forced to cut short a visit to Australia following widespread protests.

Blanc has been criticised over seminars in which he is said to teach men sexually abusive and racist methods to attract women. Twitter users have posted pictures of Blanc with his hand around the throats of women that he tweeted with the hashtag #ChokingGirlsAroundTheWorld.

Featherstone took the rare step for a minister, even in a coalition, of speaking out publicly to say she was lobbying the home secretary to examine the grounds for denying Blanc a visa.

The minister for crime prevention told the Guardian: “As the Home Office minister with responsibility for tackling violence against women and girls, I am extremely concerned by the sexist and utterly abhorrent statements Julien Blanc has made about women. If he was allowed to perform in the UK I have no doubt that cases of sexual harassment and intimidation would increase.

“Free speech is obviously hugely important, but with free speech comes responsibility. It is not appropriate to talk about choking girls under any circumstances.”

The minister wrote her letter before an intervention by Cooper, who called on May to block Blanc’s visit on the grounds that his promotion of violence against women was “not conducive to the public good”. In her letter the shadow home secretary highlighted some of the powers that could be used to stop a person coming into the country where they have displayed “unacceptable behaviour".