UK’s Braverman Resigns as Home Secretary After Sending Official Document From Personal Email

Then-Attorney General Suella Braverman arrives for a Cabinet meeting at 10 Downing Street, London, on July 12, 2022. Leon Neal/Getty Images

Suella Braverman has resigned as UK home secretary, only 43 days after she was appointed by Prime Minister Liz Truss, who is facing growing calls to step down.

Braverman explained the reason for her resignation in a letter she posted on Twitter and said it had been an “honest mistake.”

“Earlier today I sent an official document from my personal email to a trusted parliamentary colleague as part of policy engagement, and with the aim of garnering support for government policy on migration,” she said. “This constitutes a technical infringement of the rules.”

Braverman, 42, offered her resignation in person by visiting 10 Downing Street at 1 p.m. on Oct. 19 and leaving half an hour later. She will be succeeded by former Transport Secretary Grant Shapps, Downing Street confirmed.

She ran for the Conservative Party leadership during the summer but failed to make the final two and later endorsed Truss, who defeated Rishi Sunak and replaced Boris Johnson as prime minister in September.

But a mini-budget on Sept. 23 led to disquiet in financial markets, and Truss then sacked Chancellor of the Exchequer Kwasi Kwarteng, and reversed all the tax cuts that had been agreed.

In her resignation letter, Braverman went on to say: “It is obvious to everyone that we are going through a tumultuous time. I have concerns about the direction of this government. Not only have we broken key pledges that were promised to our voters but I have had serious concerns about this government’s commitment to honouring manifesto commitments, such as reducing overall migration numbers and stopping illegal migration, particularly the dangerous small boat crossings.”

‘Carousel of Conservative Chaos’

The Liberal Democrats said Braverman’s departure was part of a “carousel of Conservative chaos.”

“This is a government in chaos,” Liberal Democrat home affairs spokesman Alistair Carmichael said. “People should not be forced to watch the Conservative Party implode day after day while real people suffer.”

Ironically, Braverman had accused the opposition parties of being a “coalition of chaos” in a debate in Parliament on Oct. 18.

“It’s the Guardian-reading, tofu-eating wokerati, dare I say, the anti-growth coalition that we have to thank for the disruption that we are seeing on our roads today,” she said.

The news of her resignation was first reported by The Guardian.