Ashley James says motherhood radicalised her on This Morning
ashley james said motherhood radicalised her after returning to This Morning in late April, using the live slot to push back on misogyny and defend women speaking plainly about politics. The 39-year-old broadcaster framed that as a practical skill, not a slogan: facts first, ego last.
She said, “You have to come in with facts and not from a place of “I am right, you are wrong,”” and added, “You can’t shout a point and make people hear it. You have to lead with love – and figures.” James also said, “Donald Trump is a man of ego – he’s a bully,” during the same appearance from the studio.
Ashely James on This Morning
James first appeared on This Morning in 2023, and the late-April segment showed how quickly her profile on the programme has shifted from guest presence to political commentary. She said she was calling out misogyny from the sofa, while also talking through national service and unmarried couples’ rights.
That mix fits the public role she has built around television, social media and writing. James has sparred with Piers Morgan over men showing their emotions, challenged Bonnie Blue for reinforcing “toxic patriarchal views,” endorsed the Green Party and advocated for the trans community, and defended single mothers’ right to have IVF on the NHS on Good Morning Britain.
Bimbo and the book’s purpose
Bimbo, her debut book, was named for the insult she says has followed her since her teens. James said the point was not to turn the page into a confessional dump, adding, “I was conscious that I didn’t want to trauma-dump for the sake of it,” even though the book includes self-harming in her teens, rape in her twenties and suicidal thoughts in early motherhood.
The memoir gives her a second platform beyond television, and she is using both to argue that women should be able to speak without softening the message. Her line that finding your voice is “one of the healthiest goals you can pursue” sits alongside a more personal version of the same argument: “I love that women before us weren’t able to choose to get married, and now we get to choose”.
Ada, Alfie and Tommy Andrews
James is mum to Ada, three, and Alfie, five, with her partner Tommy Andrews, and she said motherhood changed the way she sees public debate. She had just returned from a girls’ trip to Turkey with a female friend and their young daughters, a detail that put the private and political sides of her story in the same frame.
For James, the message is not abstract empowerment language but a working method: speak with evidence, name misogyny when she sees it, and keep making the case on mainstream television. That is the shape of her public argument now, and it is broader than a single studio appearance.
