Rishi Sunak is now all but guaranteed to become Britain’s next prime minister after both the leading contenders considered his rivals in the race to replace Liz Truss pulled out before a single vote was cast among members of the Conservative party.
Sunak’s rise in British politics has been nothing short of meteoric. After entering Parliament in 2015 after a career in banking, Boris Johnson appointed him just five years later as finance minister — a role formally known as chancellor of the Exchequer, the U.K.’s Treasury.
Sunak will be the first British Asian to become prime minister and the first nonwhite to take the top job. At 42, he’ll also be the youngest prime minister in more than 200 years.
