Boris Johnson apologizes amid lockdown party scandal: 'I should have sent everyone back inside'

Boris Johnson.
(Image credit: JACK HILL/POOL/AFP via Getty Images)

U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson apologized Wednesday for briefly attending a gathering in the back garden of 10 Downing Street in May 2020, despite strict COVID-19 restrictions at the time, CNN reports.

On Monday, it was revealed that Johnson's principal private secretary Martin Reynolds had invited over 100 Downing Street staffers to BYOB, "socially distanced" drinks on May 20, 2020. At the time, Britons were prohibited "from meeting with more than one other person outdoors, and would be legally punished for doing so," CNN reports.

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Brigid Kennedy

Brigid Kennedy worked at The Week from 2021 to 2023 as a staff writer, junior editor and then story editor, with an interest in U.S. politics, the economy and the music industry.