Former Cabinet minister Michael Gove has launched an attack on US President Donald Trump, arguing the businessman could well step down in order to avoid the shame of losing the next election.
Interviewed by Christian Today, Gove said the US President will not win a second term and might even quit before 2020 to avoid the humiliation of losing to the Democrats.
The one-time justice secretary was the first to interview Trump for the British media, in a long and sympathetic piece for the Times.
“Does [Trump] have the character to see it through?” asked Gove, rejecting the likelihood of impeachment.
“On the one hand he is someone who is clearly narcissistic or egotistical enough to want to be seen as a success, and therefore he’ll want to show his critics that he can meet this challenge. On the other hand though there is just a sheer unpredictability about the way in which he sometimes responds to events, that it would be impossible I think to predict with accuracy.”
“Knowing that he might lose, he might find some means of quitting while he thinks he is ahead, though I suspect that his ego will mean he will both want to see what he can do in office and he will believe that he can prevail against whoever the Democrat opponent is,” he added.
In the candid interview Gove also confessed it had been “wrong” to betray fellow Conservative MP Boris Johnson in the run up to the Tory leadership contest last year.
Johnson is not the only Tory with whom Gove seems to have burned bridges. The Times columnist said former Prime Minister David Cameron is still not speaking to him, after they fell out over the Brexit referendum.