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By Rachel Elbaum and Alexander Smith
LONDON — British Prime Minister Theresa May told members of her party Wednesday evening that she would be prepared to step down as leader to secure their support for her contentious Brexit deal.
Her offer to resign comes after months of chaos in Parliament and speculation that she would be forced out.
A moment of high drama in the Brexit process, the move is a last-ditch effort to pass her deal to leave the European Union after a referendum in June 2016.
“And I have heard very clearly the mood of the parliamentary party,” she told a closed meeting of her own lawmakers, according to a government statement released afterward. “I know there is a desire for a new approach — and new leadership — in the second phase of the Brexit negotiations, and I won’t stand in the way of that.”
She added, “I am prepared to leave this job earlier than I intended in order to do what is right for our country and our party.”
May did not give a date for her departure. Her statement suggests it would come if and when her Brexit withdrawal agreement is passed by the House of Commons.
If May does step down, the party would need to hold a leadership election to replace her. It would be up to her successor to negotiate a future relationship with the European Union.
May has struggled to unite lawmakers in her own party around the Brexit withdrawal agreement that she painstakingly negotiated with the E.U.
The deal has been crushed twice in the House of Commons — once in January and once in March — suffering the heaviest and fourth-heaviest losses in parliamentary history.
In the British political system, the ruling party can change leaders without the need for a new general election.
Opposition to May’s plan for Brexit led some of her own lawmakers to unsuccessfully attempt to topple her in December. The next month, opposition lawmakers tried and failed to topple her government.
There has been speculation she could bring it back for a third attempt this week. If it fails again, Britain may need to ask for a longer extension to Brexit. The original divorce date has already been pushed back from March 29 until at least April 12.
If there is no deal and no extension, then Britain will crash out of the E.U. without a deal — something many experts say would severely harm the economy and trigger shortages of food, medicine and basic supplies. On Monday, the European Commission said this scenario was becoming “increasingly likely.”
May herself took over as prime minister after David Cameron resigned the morning following the vote to leave the European Union in June 2016. After several weeks of wrangling between leadership hopefuls, May’s competitors eventually bowed out leaving her as the only candidate standing.
May is the fourth Conservative Party leader to be brought down by the question of Britain’s place in Europe. Margaret Thatcher, John Major and David Cameron all faced opposition from colleagues to their more open attitude on Europe.
The main sticking point in the deal for many lawmakers is an insurance policy designed to keep open the border between Northern Ireland, which is part of the U.K., and the Republic of Ireland, which will remain part of the E.U.
Known as the backstop, hard-line Brexit supporters fear that it could trap their country in E.U. trading rules forever and have insisted on a time limit or an exit mechanism. The E.U. however, won’t agree to this because of the real risk that a hard border could trigger a return to the kind of conflict that plagued Ireland for 30 years.
There have been growing calls for a second referendum on the terms of May’s Brexit deal. On Saturday, hundreds of thousands of protesters gathered in the capital demanding a new public vote, and almost six million have signed a petition to cancel Brexit altogether.