Yeah he's dead wrong here. Even clang-format - easily the worst autoformatter I've used - is an order of magnitude more tolerable than no auto-formatting.
Sure it might not always be as good as what a perfectionist human would produce, but it's sure as hell better than what the average human produces, and it means you don't have to waste time ranting like this.
Clean Code was pretty effectively debunked in this widely shared article from 2020. We probably don't need to talk about it anymore.
Frankly I'm surprised it was ever recommended. Some of the things it says are so obviously insane, why would anyone think it was good?
My only guess is the title? "Your code sucks; maybe read this book that I haven't vetted about clean code." sort of thing?
I'd say it would be good to have a modern replacement with good advice to recommend... But in my experience you can't really learn these things by reading about them. You have to experience it (and have good natural taste).
This list of code smells is pretty decent at least: https://luzkan.github.io/smells/