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Dominic Cummings, one of British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s most powerful advisers, will leave his post in the heart of Downing Street when Brexit ends at the end of the year, after an internal battle over who should be Johnson’s chief of staff.
Cummings, who planned the 2016 Brexit referendum vote and Johnson’s landslide bid for the 2019 election, told the BBC that his position had not changed since January, when he said he wanted to be largely redundant by the end of this. year.
Transportation Secretary Grant Shapps told Sky that Cummings had planned not to remain in his position as Johnson’s senior adviser for much more than a year, once Britain left the informal membership of the European Union.
“As he wrote right at the beginning of the year in his own words, he planned to become largely redundant this year with the big thing he had worked on, of course, which was Brexit coming to an end at the end of the transition period that It’s December 31, ”Shapps said.
The departure of one of Johnson’s closest allies marks one of the most significant changes in the prime minister’s inner circle to date: Cummings was viewed by some as Johnson’s “brain”, a figure who wielded significant influence.
A committed Brexiteer who scorned the British political establishment and hurled barbs at journalists and cabinet ministers alike, Cummings was cast for the Spitting Image satirical puppet show as an alien who repeatedly threatened Johnson with resignation and at times called for eat your child.
The BBC quoted an unidentified top Downing Street source as saying that Cummings would be “out of government” by Christmas. Another unidentified source told the BBC that Mr Cummings “jumped because otherwise he would be shoved soon.”
Mr Cummings told the BBC that “rumors are made up of me threatening to resign, rumors are made up that I am asking others to resign.”
‘Johnson’s brain’
Cummings, along with his campaign partner Matthew Elliott, pushed Vote Leave to victory in the 2016 referendum. He is credited with coining the phrase: regain control.
Behind his bluster, Cummings believes that elites in the West, and the UK in particular, are out of touch with voters and have consistently failed their people while bailing out big business.
Allies and enemies see Cummings as a ruthless strategist who cares little for the conventions of traditional British politics. Known as “Dom” by his friends, who consider him a visionary, former Prime Minister David Cameron described him as a “career psycho”.
He despises Westminster’s accepted dress code of a suit and tie, wearing jeans and T-shirts in Downing Street, often accompanied by an ill-fitting woolen hat. Many conservative lawmakers don’t like his style.
But Cummings helped Johnson navigate the Brexit maze and caused parliament to oppose Brexit, setting the stage for Johnson’s victory in the 2019 election, the largest majority his party has achieved since Margaret’s election victory. Thatcher in 1987.
Cummings also likes to scold reporters. In 2019, he told Reuters to stop asking about Brexit: “You should get out of London and go talk to people who are not rich.”
However, his disregard for accepted norms was shown when he said that he had done nothing wrong by driving 250 miles from London to get childcare when Brits were being told to stay home to fight Covid-19.
As Johnson negotiates the final stages of a Brexit trade deal and grapples with a second wave of the novel coronavirus outbreak, Downing Street has been plagued by an internal battle over who should become Johnson’s chief of staff.
Johnson’s communications director, Lee Cain, resigned Wednesday. Cain, another Brexit supporter, was a close Cummings ally and worked with him on the Vote Leave campaign. – Reuters
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