Boris Johnson rejects Brexit Party electoral pact as he refuses to bow down to Nigel Farages threats

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BORIS Johnson has refused to give in to Nigel Farages threat to sabotage Tory hopes for a majority if he fails to agree an election pact.

Instead, the veteran MEPs two week ultimatum to sign up to a Leave Alliance with him began to backfire on Friday night as allies turned on him.

Boris Johnson has snubbed Nigel Farage’s electoral pact offer
The Brexit Party boss has threatened to split the Leave vote

Launching his Brexit Partys General Election campaign, Mr Farage gave Boris until November 14 when nominations close to agree to stand down Tory candidates in up to 150 Labour seats to give Mr Farages own wannabe MPs a clear run.

The Brexit Party leader also insisted Mr Johnson must dump his new exit deal with the EU, dubbing it not Brexit.

If Boris refuses, the former UKIP leader insisted he would put up candidates against the Tories in more than 500 constituencies all across the country.

Furthermore, Mr Farage threatened to send a letter to every home in the country to denounce Boris new agreement with Brussels as a sham.

FARAGE SABOTAGE

Tories fear that could split the Leave vote and give Jeremy Corbyn the keys to Downing Street.

Laying down the gauntlet, Mr Farage said: I say to Boris Johnson – drop the deal. Its not Brexit.

The real deal is a Leave alliance that wins a big majority in Parliament.

But within hours, Boris ripped up the offer, and some of Mr Farages allies turned on him for the aggressive act that could put Brexit itself at risk.

The PM said: The difficulty about doing deals with any other party is it simply risks putting Jeremy Corbyn into No10.

If you vote for any other party, the risk is youll just get Jeremy Corbyn.

Our opportunity now is to get this thing done, come back in the middle of December, knock it over the line and then take the country forward.

Also as Brexits two biggest champions clashed on Day Two of the election campaign;

  • The Sun can reveal that Boris has been warned by Tory strategists to avoid a pact with Farage at all costs as it would hammer his vote against Lib Dem and SNP challengers.
  • The Brexit Party boss claimed secret non-aggression deals were already being done between Tories and his activists at the local level.
  • The PM and the Labour boss locked out Mr Farage – as well as Lib Dem chief Jo Swinson – from their first election TV debate on November 19 by insisting it must be a head-to-head clash.

As well as taking dozens of seats off Labour in the North and the Midlands, the Tories have a double task of trying to hold on to dozens of its MPs in London the West Country and Scotland.

Voters in the pro-Remain seats fear a hard Brexit and the Brexit Partys No Deal demand.

A senior Tory campaign source said: Getting into bed with Farage would do a lot of damage for us against the Lib Dems. No way are we going to touch him.

The Tory conundrum emerged as a survey of its activists by the Conservative Home website revealed more than half do want an electoral deal with Mr Farage.

In a second bid to foment a rebellion against Boris by Brexiteer Tory MPs, Mr Farage also pledged not to run candidates against them if they publicly refuse to pass the PMs deal through the Commons.

Mr Farage told them: Renounce the treaty, and say Ill never vote for it ever again.

He added: Every day, we get phone calls from people who say please dont stand against me, and regret what Boris has done.

Tory organisers at county level are already privately agreeing local deals with the Brexit Party, Mr Farage also claimed, adding: Central office is already losing control over all of this.

But senior Tory MP Brexiteers refuted Mr Farages claims as allies also attacked his ultimatum.

The deputy chair of the hardline European Research Group of 60 Tory MPs, Mark Francois, said hed be surprised if any of the ERG take up his offer, as they back Boris deal and are very unified.

Mr Francois added: I think Nigel Farage has made a mistake. If you genuinely want to work with another political party, you dont go on television and call them liars.

Brexit Party MEP Lance Forman also called the ultimatum tactic into question, saying: They wont like to have been told if you dont do this and threatened.

Im sure Boris wont like to have been threatened by Nigel – Im sure he wont like that at all and I dont blame him for that.

And former UKIP MEP Patrick OFlynn, a close confidante of Mr Farages, insisted his offer to Boris to back a new negotiation with the EU for an immediate trade deal instead would mean another six-month Brexit delay.

Mr OFlynn said: That would give Remain high command yet more chances to scupper things and take us past the fourth anniversary of the vote to leave. I dont think Leave voters are in the mood for that.