LONDON — A field of Conservative candidates seeking to replace departing British Prime Minister Boris Johnson began to take shape Friday, even as some party lawmakers pushed to get the scandal-tarnished leader out of office before his replacement is elected over the summer.
Johnson announced his resignation on Thursday — a dizzying about-face after months of insisting he would stay in the job despite mounting ethics scandals and growing Conservative discontent.
He quit as party leader with a statement to the nation outside 10 Downing St., but said he would stay on as prime minister until his successor is chosen by the party. That decision didn’t sit well with some of his Conservative colleagues, who worry that Johnson lacks the authority to hang on, or could do mischief even as a caretaker prime minister.
James Cleverly, who was appointed education secretary Thursday after his predecessor quit during a mass exodus of ministers, defended Johnson’s decision to stay.
“It’s right that he has stood down and it’s right that he has put a team in place to continue governing whilst the selection procedure flows for his successor,” Cleverly told Sky News.
Party officials on Monday are expected to set out the timetable for a leadership contest, with the aim of having a winner by the end of the summer. The two-step process involves Tory lawmakers voting to reduce the field of candidates to two, who will go to a ballot of all party members.
Lawmaker Tom Tugendhat, who chairs the House of Commons’ influential Foreign Affairs Committee, became the second candidate to declare he is running, after Attorney General Suella Braverman. Former Health Secretary Sajid Javid and ex-Treasury chief Rishi Sunak — whose resignations this week helped topple Johnson — are also likely contenders, along with Foreign Secretary Liz Truss, Defense Secretary Ben Wallace and Education Secretary Nadhim Zahawi.
Tony Travers, professor of government at the London School of Economics, said the party would be seeking a leader “a bit less exciting” than Johnson.
“Less exciting, but competent,” he said
Johnson remains in office atop a caretaker administration but many Conservatives say a lame-duck leader is the last thing the country needs amid Russia’s war in Ukraine and a worsening cost-of-living crisis triggered by soaring food and energy prices.
The prime minister’s spokesman, Max Blain, said Johnson would abide by…
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