Does Boris Johnson's victory mean a softer Brexit?

He campaigned on getting Brexit done. Here's what that might look like.

Boris Johnson campaigning
(Image credit: ADRIAN DENNIS/AFP via Getty Images)

In the wake of Thursday's emphatic Tory election triumph in the U.K., one thing about Brexit is certain: Three and a half years after voting to do so, and two general elections later, the country will now definitely leave the EU.

Even before the election campaign began, Conservative Campaign Headquarters had distilled their message down to three words: "Get Brexit done." It was the cornerstone of their campaign. It promised to move decisively past all the deadlock and the bickering, and it looks now to have been devastatingly effective: Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been handed a decisive mandate to move forward into a brave new world of clarity — a "huge great stonking mandate," as he put it. And yet, just at the point where everything should be coming into focus on the issue of Brexit, nobody knows what it will actually look like. Perhaps, therefore, it is time to take a guess.

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William Gritten

William Gritten is a London-born, New York-based strategist and writer focusing on politics and international affairs.