British Conservative lawmaker Rishi Sunak will replace Liz Truss as the next leader of the ruling Conservative Party and the country’s prime minister, 1922 Committee Chairman Graham Brady announced on Monday.
Sunak won the race after his only opponent, Penny Mordaunt, dropped out. Sunak will officially become prime minister once he is appointed to the post by King Charles III. At 42, he will also be the UK’s youngest prime minister in more than 200 years.
Sunak was the favorite to become the UK’s third autumn prime minister, and the fifth in six years. He came second to Truss in the previous contest, but his repeated warnings about her economic plan proved correct in record time and he has garnered a good number of supporters within the party.
Sunak’s only competition was Cabinet member Penny Mourdant, who placed third over the summer. But Mourdant announced on Monday that she is withdrawing from the UK leadership race after failing to gain much momentum in the race. She did so through a statement posted on her Twitter account.
As she announced that she was dropping out of the Conservative Party leadership race, Penny Mordaunt offered her “full support” for Rishi Sunak as the UK’s next Prime Minister.
The next prime minister will also have to take the reins of a country mired in economic darkness and resist growing calls to seek a new mandate by calling general elections.