Lord Adonis Deletes And Apologises For 'Racist' Sajid Javid Tweet

The home secretary told Lord Adonis 'you’re better than this'.

Labour peer Lord Andrew Adonis has apologised for sharing a cartoon of new home secretary Sajid Javid which has been accused of being “racist”.

The tweet, which has since been deleted, features a cartoon drawing of Javid, who replaced Amber Rudd as home secretary after she stepped down last weekend over the Windrush scandal.

Next to Javid in the cartoon is a board headed “targets” and the overhead caption reads: “I just want to settle in, get organized, then deport my parents.”

Lord @Andrew_Adonis blocking me on Twitter is not going to block out the vile disgusting truth about your nasty racist cartoon tweet targeting my friend @sajidjavid#EnoughIsEnough pic.twitter.com/9MGoqA1nei

— Amandeep SinghBhogal (@AmandeepBhogal) May 6, 2018

The cartoon sparked outcry, with Tory MP Sarah Wollaston telling Lord Adonis that there was “no excuse of this deeply offensive personal insult targeting” of her colleague.

No excuse for this deeply offensive personal insult targeting @sajidjavid & his family. @Andrew_Adonis should delete & apologise

— Sarah Wollaston MP (@sarahwollaston) May 6, 2018

Cabinet minister Penny Mordaunt also rounded on Lord Adonis, saying the tweet displayed “profoundly poor judgement”.

Hope this display of profoundly poor judgement is short lived, that you now regret it and plan to put things right.

— Penny Mordaunt MP (@PennyMordaunt) May 6, 2018

LBC radio host Maajid Nawaz said he was “appalled” that Lord Adonis “could endorse the racist hounding of” Javid.

WATCH & RT: Hey @Andrew_Adonis I’m appalled you could endorse the racist hounding of Home Secretary @sajidjavid for the crime of WrongThink due to his being an ethnic-minority conservative. This @LBC clip of mine is especially for you PS: I’ve never voted conservative in my life https://t.co/8VCjGmCoUC

— Maajid - (Mājid) [maːʤɪd] ماجد (@MaajidNawaz) May 6, 2018

Javid responded directly to Lord Adonis, writing on Twitter “you’re better than this”.

Former education minister Lord Adonis later deleted the tweet and apologised to Javid for the “poor taste” cartoon.

Lord Adonis wrote: “Sajid, on reflection I think the cartoon is too personal and in poor taste. I have deleted it. I am sorry. Andrew.”

Sajid, on reflection I think the cartoon is too personal and in poor taste. I have deleted it. I am sorry. Andrew https://t.co/dJyFfdZRH1

— Andrew Adonis (@Andrew_Adonis) May 6, 2018

Javid, who is the son of a Pakistani bus driver, banned the phrase “hostile environment” in relation to enforcing immigration laws after he became home secretary last week.

Just hours after replacing Rudd, the Tory minister sought to reassure MPs that incidents like the Windrush debacle would not happen on his watch and repeatedly referred to himself as a “second-generation migrant”.

He said he was “personally committed and invested” in setting right the procedures which saw people who had lived in the UK all their adult lives face deportation.

But his move to use the phrase “compliant environment” instead was criticised by Labour MP David Lammy in the Commons last week.

Lammy accused Javid of using the language of slave owners and fascists by insisting illegal immigrants should be subject to a “compliant environment”.

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