Boris Johnson said on Thursday he would resign as Britain’s prime minister, bowing to calls from ministerial colleagues and lawmakers from his Conservative Party.
Below is a rundown of some of the ones that could be in the box to replace it. However, there is no clear favorite and they are not listed in order of likely prospects.
liz truss
Britain’s Foreign Secretary Liz Truss arrives at 10 Downing Street for a cabinet meeting in London, Tuesday, June 14, 2022.
AP Photo/Alberto Pezzali
The foreign secretary is the favorite among the rank and file of the ruling Conservative Party and has regularly topped polls of party members conducted by the Conservative Home website.
Truss has a carefully cultivated public image and was photographed in a tank last year, echoing a famous 1986 photo of Britain’s first female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher.
The 46-year-old initially campaigned against Brexit but, after the referendum, said she had changed her mind.
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Boris Johnson agrees to resign, will remain PM for now
She spent the first two years of Johnson’s term as international trade secretary and last year was named Britain’s chief negotiator with the European Union.
Truss is now in charge of dealing with the EU on post-Brexit trade rules for Northern Ireland, where he has taken an increasingly hard line in negotiations.
She said Monday that Johnson had her “100% support” and urged her colleagues to support him.
jeremy hunting
Britain’s Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt arrives for a Cobra meeting at 10 Downing Street in London, Monday, July 22, 2019.
AP Photo/Frank Augstein
The 55-year-old former foreign secretary finished second to Johnson in the 2019 leadership contest. He would offer a more serious and less controversial leadership style after the turmoil of Johnson’s premiership.
Over the past two years, Hunt has used his experience as a former health secretary to chair parliament’s health select committee and has not been tarnished by having served in the current government.
Earlier this year, he said his ambition to become prime minister “hasn’t completely faded.” Hunt said he voted to oust Johnson in a confidence vote last month that the prime minister narrowly won.
Hunt supported remaining in the EU before the 2016 vote. It is unclear whether he would feel the need to take a hard line against Brussels, to win the support of Conservative voters, or whether he might pursue a more pragmatic relationship to improve trade later. to Brexit.
ben wallace
Britain’s Defense Secretary Ben Wallace arrives at 10 Downing Street in London, Wednesday, July 6, 2022.
AP Photo/Frank Augstein
Defense Minister Ben Wallace, 52, has risen in recent months to overtake Truss as the most popular member of government among Conservative Party members, according to Conservative Home, thanks to his handling of the Ukraine crisis.
A former soldier, he was mentioned in dispatches in 1992 for an incident in which the patrol he commanded captured an Irish Republican Army guerrilla unit suspected of trying to carry out a bomb attack on British troops.
He began his political career as a Delegate Member of the Scottish Assembly in May 1999, before being first elected to the Westminster Parliament in 2005.
He was security minister from 2016 until he took up his current role three years later, winning applause when his department evacuated British citizens and allies from Afghanistan last year and for sending weapons to Kyiv.
He supported staying in the EU before the referendum.
Rishi Sunak
FILE – Britain’s Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak attends a cabinet meeting at 10 Downing Street, London, on May 24, 2022.
Daniel Leal/Pool via AP, File
Sunak, who resigned as finance minister on Tuesday saying the British public “rightly expects government to be conducted properly, competently and seriously,” was until last year the favorite to succeed Johnson.
He was praised for a COVID-19 economic rescue package, including a costly job retention program that averted mass unemployment.
But Sunak later faced criticism for not giving enough cost-of-living support to households. Revelations about the non-domiciled tax status of his wealthy wife and a fine he received, along with Johnson, for violating COVID lockdown rules have damaged his position.
His tax and spending budget last year put Britain on track for its biggest tax burden since the 1950s, undermining his claims to favor lower taxes.
Sunak voted to leave the EU in 2016.
Sajid Javid
Britain’s Health Secretary Sajid Javid arrives for a cabinet meeting in Downing Street, London, on July 5, 2022. – Britain’s Health Secretary Sajid Javid resigned on Tuesday after a series of of scandals undermined the government of Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
Photo by JUSTIN TALLIS/AFP) (Photo by JUSTIN TALLIS/AFP via Getty Images
Javid was the first cabinet minister to resign in protest over allegations that Johnson misled the public about what he knew about sexual harassment allegations against a Conservative lawmaker.
A former banker and champion of free markets, Javid has held various cabinet posts, most recently as health minister. He resigned as Johnson’s finance minister in 2020.
The son of Pakistani Muslim immigrant parents, he is a Thatcher admirer and finished fourth in the 2019 leadership race to replace former Prime Minister Theresa May.
Javid supported remaining in the EU “with regret and halfheartedly”, saying he feared the fallout from an exit vote would add to economic turmoil.
Nadhim Zahaui
FILE – Britain’s Secretary of State for Education Nadhim Zahawi leaves after attending a cabinet meeting at 10 Downing Street in London on June 7, 2022.
AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth, File
The newly appointed finance minister impressed as vaccines minister when Britain had one of the fastest COVID vaccine launches in the world.
Zahawi’s personal story as a former refugee from Iraq who came to Britain as a child sets him apart from other contenders.
He co-founded the YouGov polling company before entering parliament in 2010. His last job was as education secretary. Zahawi said last week that it would be a “privilege” to be prime minister at some point.
He supported leaving the EU.
penny mordaunt
Britain’s Defense Secretary Penny Mordaunt speaks ahead of the launch of Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt’s leadership campaign for the Conservative Party in London, Monday, June 10, 2019.
AP Photo/Matt Dunham
Johnson sacked the former defense secretary when she became prime minister after she backed her rival, Hunt, during the last leadership contest.
Mordaunt was a passionate supporter of leaving the European Union and made national headlines by participating in a now-defunct diving reality show.
Mordaunt, now a junior trade minister, called the government lockdown-breaking parties “shameful.” He had previously expressed his loyalty to Johnson.
Mordaunt campaigned to leave the EU in 2016.
tom tugendhat
Tom Tugendhat responds after Prime Minister Boris Johnson briefed MPs in the House of Commons in London on the latest situation in Afghanistan. Picture date: Monday September 6, 2021.
Photo by House of Commons/PA Images via Getty Images
The chairman of parliament’s foreign affairs committee, and a former soldier who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan, has already indicated he would run for any leadership competition.
He has been a regular critic of Johnson and would offer his party a complete break with previous governments.
However, he is relatively untested because he has never served in the cabinet.
He voted to remain in the EU.
her brave
Suella Braverman, Britain’s Attorney General, arrives for a cabinet meeting at Downing Street in London, Tuesday, January 25, 2022.
AP Photo/Kirsty Wigglesworth
Braverman, the attorney general who backs Brexit, has said he plans to run for the leadership. She was heavily criticized by lawyers during her tenure after the government tried to breach international law on post-Brexit business rules in Northern Ireland.
She campaigned to leave the EU and served as deputy minister in the Brexit department under May, but resigned in protest at the then prime minister’s proposed Brexit deal, saying it did not go far enough to sever ties with the bloc. .
(Editing by Michael Holden, Jon Boyle, Catherine Evans, Mark Heinrich and Andrew Heavens)