British prime minister Boris Johnson has landed in hot water after live footage of him walking into a fridge to avoid questions from a reporter made the rounds on social media.
Johnson was delivering milk to voters in Yorkshire as part of a photo opportunity early Wednesday morning when he was approached by Jonathan Swain, a reporter for Good Morning Britain, a daily program.
“Morning, Prime Minister, would you come on ‘Good Morning Britain,’ Prime Minister?” Swain asked live on the morning broadcast, to which Rob Oxley, Johnson’s press secretary turned and said, ‘Oh for f— sake.”
Oxley’s expletive prompted a shocked response from show hosts Piers Morgan and Susanne Reid, who uttered “ooh!” in unison, while video of Johnson and his team giving the reporter the cold shoulder continued to play.
“I’ve just had a reaction from one of the minders. OK, no need to push, thank you very much,” Swain is heard saying as Boris continues to walk in the other direction.
“I’ll be with you in a second,” the prime minister says before turning his back and walking directly into an oversized refrigerator.
“It’s a very frosty reception we’ve had so far,” Swain said while laughing.
As of Wednesday morning, almost 21,000 tweets have been shared with regards to the video, and the hashtag #fridgegate becoming the top trend in Britain. Many criticized the prime minister’s response to the media, calling him “cowardly” and “pathetic.”
This morning I went on GMB and answered some tough questions,” tweeted Labour Party candidate Laura Pidcock. “I think it’s right that politicians are held to account — why does Boris Johnson think he’s above the rest of us?”
The incident is not the first time Johnson has been criticized for his campaign tactics during this general election.
His efforts to parody an iconic scene from Christmas movie, ‘Love actually’ were dismissed by voters and criticized by the one of the lead actors, Hugh Grant, who played the role of British prime minister. “”I did notice that one of the cards from the original film which he didn’t hold up was the one where Andrew Lincoln held up a card saying, ‘Because at Christmas you tell the truth,'” Grant told BBC Radio 4.
“I just wonder if the spin doctors in the Tory party thought that would be a card that wouldn’t look too great in Boris Johnson’s hands,” he added.
With files from the Washington Post
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