Kemi Badenoch slams critics who downplay her achievements

The new leader of the UK Conservative Party, Kemi Badenoch, has hit back at critics questioning her rise to leadership, accusing them of relying on racist tropes to undermine her success.

In an interview with The Times, Badenoch dismissed claims that she emerged as leader only because of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) policies, insisting such suggestions were rooted in prejudice.

“There’s a certain cadre of people who clearly can’t cope with the fact that I won this and I’m doing it. The level of personal attacks from anonymous people is hysterical. People used to talk about Trump derangement syndrome. I think there’s a Kemi derangement syndrome,” she said.

Badenoch said critics often downplay her achievements with remarks like, “How could she possibly have done this? It must have been DEI”, arguing that this reinforces harmful stereotypes of black people as “lazy, corrupt or all DEI hires.” She described such narratives as “extraordinary,” stressing that she judges everyone on merit.

The 45-year-old politician, who spent her early years in Nigeria before moving to the UK at 16, also revealed she has faced a wave of racist abuse online since becoming leader. She, however, clarified that Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary and her rival in the leadership contest, was not responsible for the speculation.

“There’s a whole swathe of stuff online: a lot of ethno-nationalism creeping up, lots of stuff about my race and my ethnicity and the tropes around, ‘Well, she couldn’t possibly have done this all by herself’,” Badenoch noted.

She added, “People who used these tropes were trying to tell a story about me that is wholly untrue and which everyone around me knows is untrue. I think even Rob himself finds it distressing, but it’s just something that we deal with.”