Breaking news: Boris Johnson drops effort to return to power as U.K. prime minister, according to British media reports.
LONDON — Boris Johnson, after campaigning hard for a comeback, suddenly dropped out of the race to return as Britain’s prime minister on Sunday, saying it was in the national interest to withdraw.
In a statement, Johnson said he had enough support to proceed to a vote among Conservative Party lawmakers on Monday. That claim was unsupported by tallies of lawmakers by the BBC and The Guardian, which did not show Johnson reaching the hurdle of 100 votes of 357 Tory members in the House of Commons.Johnson said, “I believe I have much to offer but I am afraid that this is simply not the right time.
"But in the course of the last days I have sadly come to the conclusion that this would simply not be the right thing to do. You can’t govern effectively unless you have a united party in parliament.In fact, the problem for the mop-headed former leader ousted in July was this: a lot of his fellow Conservative Party lawmakers, alongside so-called Tory grandees and once-friendly tabloid hacks, thout his return to power would spell “disaster.