I was disappointed by his comments suggesting Abdi-Wali was selected because she's a Black woman in a headscarf. She has lived locally all her life and is the leader of Camden Council - as strong a background for a local MP as you could ask for.
By all means call her a career politician. Say she backed Starmer with one eye on the seat. The whole party had to, and that's how you get selected in a legacy party. Say she didn't speak out on the issues you care about; question her record; demand scrutiny; All fair game.
But suggesting she couldn't hold her own views, or couldn't have got where she is on merit, because she's a woman in a headscarf? That’s cynical and sexist.
It’s also manipulative to explain the Greens' struggle to campaign against her as progressives being too soft to criticise a former child refugee. She's a 42-year-old woman running a council with a budget of over £300 million.
The Green argument can’t both be “we must have more global majority people elected” and when another party elects ‘global majority’ politicians to turn around and say “oh these are all over-promoted puppets”. This is why identity politics is unworkable.