Kemi Badenoch’s Leadership Is No Win For Black Women

Let’s rewind to July, when the leadership race kicked off with six contenders: Badenoch, Priti Patel, James Cleverly, Robert Jenrick, Mel Stride and Tom Tugendhat. By October, just three contenders remained: Badenoch, Cleverly (then leading comfortably) and Jenrick. Cleverly lost significant ground and was eliminated in the final MPs’ vote. A popular theory among political analysts is that Cleverly lent votes to another candidate, likely Jenrick, believing he’d make an easier opponent in the final round. If this theory is correct, then the tactic clearly backfired and Cleverly ended up losing more votes than expected. With the Conservative Party reduced to just 121 seats — their smallest parliamentary presence — little miscalculations like this cost big time.