The UK’s ruling Conservative Party has suspended one of its lawmakers, Lee Anderson, after he refused to apologize for racist comments aimed at London Mayor Sadiq Khan.

The Conservative Member of Parliament for Ashfield, Anderson told GB News late Friday night that “Islamists” had “got control” of the mayor of London.

Khan, the first Muslim to be mayor of London and a member of the opposition Labour Party, described the remarks as “pouring fuel on the fire of anti-Muslim hatred.”

The action means that Anderson, a deputy chairman of the Conservative party until last month, will sit in Parliament as an independent. Anderson resigned last month to rebel against Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s bill to send asylum-seekers to Rwanda.

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The chair of the Labour Party, Anneliese Dodds, said Anderson’s comments were “unambiguously racist and Islamophobic.” Sadiq Khan said in an interview with Sky News on Saturday that he was not clear why Sunak was neither calling out the behavior nor condemning it.

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