UK’s Suella Braverman resigns as interior minister after 43 days

The U.K.’s Suella Braverman is resigning from her position as interior minister after just 43 days in the role, she announced Wednesday, citing a breach of rules as well as concerns over the direction of the government.

In a resignation letter posted to Twitter, Braverman said: “It is with the greatest regret that I am choosing to tender my resignation.”

In the letter, she said she had sent an official document — a draft written ministerial statement that had not been published — from her personal email to a parliamentary colleague in order to get support for her policy. This, she said, “constitutes a technical infringement of the rules.”

She said that she had realized her mistake and reported it to official channels, but that resigning was the right thing to do. 

The departure is the latest surprise turn of events for the U.K.’s Conservative Party, whose government led by Prime Minister Liz Truss has come under increasing fire for throwing markets into turbulence and drastically changing policy plans within the span of a few days.

Braverman ran against Truss for the Conservative leadership race this summer but was knocked out in an early stage. She has held past roles as Attorney General, from 2020 to 2022, and in the ‘Brexit’ department in 2018.

In her short time as Home Secretary, beginning with the Truss government on Sept. 6, she has made headlines for outspoken comments on reducing net migration, affirming the controversial policy of deporting asylum seekers to Rwanda, and just this morning defending the government’s Public Order Bill.

It comes at a hugely turbulent time for the government, with Truss under intense pressure to resign just two months into her premiership after a budget on Sept. 23 sparked chaos in financial markets.

On Friday, Truss fired her Finance Minister Kwasi Kwarteng over the incident, despite having campaigned on the program of tax cuts which set off the chaos.

Kwarteng was replaced by former health secretary Jeremy Hunt, who on Monday proceeded to reverse the majority of the economic policies laid out in the government’s mini-budget announced on Sept. 23. Brought in in a bid to calm markets and project an image of stability, Hunt has provoked rumor of being more in control of government than Truss and even a potential successor.

Referring to the wider government, Braverman added in her letter that it was “obvious to everyone that we are going through a tumultuous time” and said she had “concerns about the direction of this government.”

She said she was concerned about the breaking of key pledges to voters, though did not specifically highlight the recent U-turn on fiscal policy, instead citing pledges to reduce overall migration numbers and small boat crossings to the UK. Truss and Braverman had been reportedly clashing behind the scenes on revising UK migration policy as the nation faces acute worker shortages.

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