Fairly troubled record as a cabinet minister with plenty of scandals and a few really poorly judged speeches. His opposition also got some good ammunition for the 2026 election from his party leadership opponents, which they'll just quote.

He won a leadership contest that had particularly weak prospective leaders, with a hard line nationalist who wanted to make every election a referendum on independence (a policy Sturgeon had adopted briefly for the 2024 Westminster election but which caused a lot of blowback in the party, so it was a non-starter) and a religious lass from a minor sect who had quite conservative views as his opponents. He squeaked a 52-48 victory over the religious lass with the members, but also has low approval already due to past scandals (-20 net versus Forbes' -8 net approval). He's also going to have to fight an election campaign in 2024 in Westminster and by 2026, the next Scottish election, the SNP will be 19 years in government, so fatigue may begin to set in from voters about a lack of change or progress in improving their daily lives.