According to a Reuters count of Conservative legislators who have publicly expressed support, Johnson has 37, Sunak has 70, and Mordaunt has 20.
A return to the top would be an astonishing comeback for Johnson, who is still well-liked by party members despite the fact that 52% of Britons, according to a YouGov poll of 3,429 adults conducted on Friday, would not want to see him serve as prime minister once more.
Johnson reportedly informed Conservative member James Duddridge that he is "up for it" and that he will come back to Britain on Saturday from a vacation in the Caribbean.
However, others questioned Johnson's ability to secure 100 nominations after he compared himself to a Roman tyrant who had been installed twice to quell crises. His three years as premier were marred by scandals and accusations of wrongdoing.
Johnson's return, according to former Conservative leader William Hague, was arguably the worst notion he had ever heard in his nearly 50 years as a party member. He claimed it would result in the Conservatives going into a "death spiral."
The oddsmakers had Johnson as the favourite, followed by Sunak, a former Goldman Sachs analyst who was appointed finance minister just as the COVID-19 outbreak struck and finished second to Truss in the previous leadership race. Mordaunt is once more ranked third.
The winner will be revealed the following week. If three candidates meet the requirement, a vote by lawmakers on Monday will eliminate one candidate, and party members will then choose between the remaining two, with the winner announced on Friday. If only one candidate receives more than 100 nominations from lawmakers by Monday, that person will be declared the winner.
The scene of yet another unpopular premier giving a speech in Downing Street on Thursday served as a reminder of how erratic British politics have become since the Brexit vote in 2016.
British instability, according to Luxembourg's Prime Minister Xavier Bettel, was a result of Britain's decision to leave the EU.
He told reporters in Brussels, "I hope that they will soon be stable because even though they are not a family member any longer, they are a friend and a neighbour."
After Johnson, the Brexit campaign's spokesperson, led his party to victory in the most recent general election in 2019, many Conservatives argued that Johnson alone has a mandate for leadership. However, not all members of the public were persuaded.
"I believe they are counting on him to win the next election,"
Several Conservative politicians, newspapers, opposition parties, and even some of them have urged for the holding of a general election.
Labour Party leader Keir Starmer remarked that the Conservatives "cannot respond to their latest debacle by yet again simply clicking their fingers and moving the people at the top without the permission of the British people."
They are not authorised to subject the nation to yet another experiment.
To prevent a bloody contest, some Conservative lawmakers have urged their peers to unite behind one candidate.
Sunak, who cautioned that Truss's fiscal measures ran the risk of causing economic instability, is disliked by certain party members since he assisted in starting the uprising against Johnson.
Mordaunt is seen as a fresh face, but is also untested.
The next leader will inherit an
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