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Speaking to EU sources, they are not particularly worried about Boris Johnson as PM. But that is based on their expectation that he hits a massive wall in October which leaves him stuck with May's deal or no deal.
This is b/c several big member states have decided to say "Sorry, no" if Johnson asks for an Article 50 extension just for the purpose of rewriting the deal wholesale - and it just takes one "No" to pull the plug.
That leaves PM Johnson in tricky territory end of October. He could ask for an extension that he knows will be rejected, and then blame the EU for 'no deal' and the ensuing turmoil.
Some in EU are a bit worried about this because they think it's unfair if they get blamed for no deal. Others say the chaos which has enveloped UK politics is so loud and public that will be clear where the blame comes from, especially if parliament is prorogued.
Other option - and a few in EU believe only Johnson could pull this off - is to tweak the political declaration and then sell the whole package as a "Boris deal", even though it's basically May's deal. I doubt that will fly with Brexiteer MPs.
There is sig. EU appetite for the backstop being downgraded to the Northern Ireland-only version that was initially agreed before May for it extended to all-UK. But, and Gove made this point several times, that's such thin gruel when expectations of next Tory leader are so high
So when you step back and look at things, it is nearly impossible to see how the October 31 deadline doesn't trigger 'no deal,' unless the EU is prepared to offer up something. What might that be? Well, a time limit on backstop has been floated by some...
But that was knocked down quite explicitly by Mark Rutte this week. That was a fairly big blow, because most people now realise that, in a cruel twist of irony, the backstop, which was designed to avoid a hard border, is going to be the thing that leads to a hard border
BTW if you thought this was an interesting read, I write a weekly policy column in the Brexit newsletter on Fridays where I go into a lot more detail on this kind of stuff. You can sign up here:
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