BORIS JOHNSON TO BE NEXT BRITISH PRIME MINISTER
Array of crises, battles over EU departure ahead
London — Boris Johnson aspires to be a modern-day Winston Churchill. Critics fear he’s a British Donald Trump.
Johnson won the contest to lead the governing Conservative Party on Tuesday, and is set to become Britain’s prime minister today.
Like revered World War II leader Churchill, Johnson aims to turn a national crisis — in this case Brexit — into a triumph. Like Trump, he gained his country’s top political office by deploying celebrity, clowning, provocation and a loose relationship with the truth.
Maintaining strong relations with the volatile Trump will be one of the new leader’s major challenges. So will negotiating Britain’s stalled exit from the European Union, the conundrum that brought down predecessor Theresa May.
London — Boris Johnson, a British politician best known for his eccentric and unpredictable ways, overwhelmingly won a party leadership contest on Tuesday that also anoints him as the country’s next prime minister. He is expected to take up the top post today, promising a swift divorce from the European Union.
Johnson, 55, will immediately face an array of crises. A hard-line Brexiter, he insists Britain will depart the EU as scheduled on Oct. 31, despite bitter national divisions on how or even whether to do so. He also confronts high tensions with Iran over oil shipping in the Persian Gulf and a brewing rebellion within the ranks of his own party.
President Donald Trump, who has been a booster of both Brexit and Johnson, swiftly tweeted his congratulations, without waiting for Johnson to formally take office. “Congratulations to Boris Johnson on becoming the new Prime Minister of the United Kingdom,” the president wrote. “He will be great!”
Because of the quirks of the British political system, only dues-paying members of the governing Conservative Party — just 160,000 people — were eligible to vote in the leadership contest. That means that the new prime minister was in effect picked by less than 1 percent of the electorate, chosen by a group that is older, wealthier and more likely to be white than the average voter.
Johnson’s acceptance speech was delivered in his trademark exuberant hand-waving style, including some language that might be considered unconventional, coming from a product of Britain’s most elite educational institutions.
“Dude, we are going to energize the country!” he declared. “We are going to get Brexit done!” (He told bemused listeners that the jaunty mode of address was a play of words on a campaign acronym.)
The prime-minister-in-waiting has leaned heavily on the notion that sheer national determination can make a success of Brexit, despite unabated polarization and rancor that erupted after the June 2016 Brexit referendum.
His detractors say Johnson has a misplaced faith that his own charisma will lead the Europeans to allow Britain to shake off EU rules while maintaining many of the essential privileges of membership in the bloc.