Attempts to discredit Boris through the law will make him more popular

Jacob Rees-Mogg defends ‘diligent’ Boris Johnson

There are still a number of Tory MPs who believe that Rishi Sunak has colluded with Remainer civil servants to try to discredit Boris Johnson by framing him as a criminal.

If this is true then the decision to report Partygate to the police for a second time was one of the great political miscalculations of recent years since David Cameron assured Jean-Claude Juncker that he would easily win the EU referendum back in 2016.

Just as Mr Johnson seemed to be fading into the background doing Dallas with his supporters fragmented and isolated someone in the Cabinet Office thought about putting right back into the centre of things.

Whoever picked up the phone and reported him to the police (again) for Partygate, did the former Prime minister a huge political favour.

And the stupid part of it was that all Johnson’s opponents needed to do was to look across the Atlantic to see what similar shenanigans did for Donald Trump.

Back in November, Donald Trump’s presidential comeback hopes seemed to be fading.

The midterms had been a bit underwhelming for the Republicans and disastrous for many of his handpicked candidates like former NFL star Herschel Walker in Georgia.

Already, the Republican establishment was toasting the nomination of Florida Governor Ron DeSantis and the end of their Trump nightmare.

Then the FBI and an obscure Democrat lawyer in New York called Alvin Brigg both had one of those “hold my beer” moments and decided to pursue criminal charges against the former President.

Suddenly, Trump was back, the rallies were packed and the polls started to go the former President’s way.

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The raids on his Florida home over documents he had allegedly taken from the White House and then the indictment by a grand jury in Manhattan over hush money payments to porn star Stormy Daniels did not have the effect his opponents intended.

What became clear to most reasonable-minded American voters was that the Democrats were “weaponising the law”.

Trump became a victim (usually a quality beloved of the left) and a martyr, especially when the authorities had to admit they had made false claims.

Now Trump is back as the clear frontrunner to win the Republican nomination and he is favourite to beat Joe Biden.

As Kevin Roberts, the President of the powerful Heritage think tank which is literally putting together the next Republican White House administration, noted Trump “got a massive boost” from the legal issues.

And so it is proving in Westminster and around the country for Boris Johnson.

When news broke this week that the police had been called in again it did not produce another round of people saying how awful the former Prime Minister is.

What it did do – especially in the equally ridiculous attempt to stitch up Home Secretary Suella Braverman – was galvanise Tory MPs into a state of fury.

This was not just the usual complainers about Sunak and his mob on the right of the party, MPs more on the centre were also outraged by the treatment of Mr Johnson.

A former cabinet minister, who was not part of the rightwing allies, told Express.co.uk that the attempt to discredit Mr Johnson was “disgusting” and had “Sunak’s fingerprints all over it.”

Meanwhile, the disaffected grassroots of the Conservative Party, ignored and looked down on by Mr Sunak’s allies have reacted strongly as well.

The Conservative Democratic Organisation (CDO) set up to channel that disaffection in the party reported a surge in people getting in touch to see how they could help.

A spokeswoman said: “Conservative Party members are rightly concerned about the implications for democracy and good governance as a result of what has been happening over the last few days, not just with Boris but with Suella and Dominic too.

“CDO exists for all Conservative Party members, which includes our MPs, and so we do have a role to play in voicing the concerns of our members.

“We have been contacted by numerous grassroots members across the country over the last few days, and we will ensure these voices will be heard.”

While a close ally of Mr Johnson’s told Express.co.uk yesterday that there is “no chance” of him coming back, it was interesting that attempting to remove Mr Sunak before the election has not been ruled out especially in the wake of what happened this week.

If politicians still were cogniscient of the Bible they would know the famous piece of advice contained in Proverbs 26:17: “He who passes by and meddles in a quarrel not his own Is like one who takes a dog by the ears.”

In other words, let sleeping dogs lie.

The Democrats and Mr Sunak’s allies may yet rue the day they did not follow that sage advice and reawoke the political careers of Boris Johnson and Donald Trump.

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