Penny Mordaunt quoted Margaret Thatcher when asked what she will do about the 'war on woke'
Penny Mordaunt moved to distance herself from her previous vocal support for LGBT issues during her Tory leadership campaign launch on Wednesday morning.
The trade minister insisted that she was the person that “Labour fear the most” as she looked to sure up support among her colleagues.
Mordaunt is currently second-favourite to replace Boris Johnson as prime minister behind Rishi Sunak.
Liz Truss, Tom Tugendhat, Suella Braverman, Nadhim Zahawi, Kemi Badenoch and Jeremy Hunt are also still in the race.
MPs will today begin the process of whittling down the candidates to a final two who will be voted on by party members, with the final result due on September 5th.
Anyone who fails to get 30 votes this afternoon will be eliminated from the contest, with the last-placed candidate losing their place even if they get above that threshold.
In a bid to appeal to the right-wing factions of the Conservative Party, Mordaunt restated her Brexit credentials before making a bizarre trans dig to set out her position on the 'war on woke'.
Channelling the words of a divisive former leader, she joked: “I think it was Margaret Thatcher who said every prime minister needs a Willy. A woman like me doesn’t have one.”
The comments caused quite a stir on social media, with Arthur Webber appealing to Tory leadership candidates to stop using the issue as part of their "pointless culture wars".
https://twitter.com/BernieTranders/status/1547160896778158082?s=20&t=t6-7ljqjSt2ujmHDRXJV1A
Another said "is this really the best the Conservatives have to offer" as they shared the clip on social media:
https://twitter.com/hewitson10/status/1547159420366356480?s=20&t=t6-7ljqjSt2ujmHDRXJV1A
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