The Chosen Ones: 20 Starmer Loyalists Hand-Picked for Safe Seats

A former parliamentary candidate who was dropped and replaced for the July 4 general election has quit the Labour Party, but Sir Keir Starmer told broadcasters on Tuesday there were “brilliant Labour teams out in every constituency, fighting for votes in this general election.” Faiza Shaheen, who stood in Chingford and Woodford Green against former Conservative Party leader Iain Duncan Smith in 2019, published a statement on social media platform X in which she said, “My removal shows that the desires of local members and my community means nothing to the people at the top of the party.” She is one of a number of candidates who have been deselected, suspended, or encouraged to retire—amid speculation about future peerages for some of those who are voluntarily standing down—in order to make way for a cohort who might be expected to be more loyal to Sir Keir....