In an interview with the Daily Mail on Friday, US businesswoman and former model Jennifer Arcuri admitted to having an affair with UK Prime Boris Johnson while he worked as mayor of London and was married to his then-wife Marina Wheeler.
“I think that goes without saying. It’s pretty much out there […], but I’m not going to talk about it”, Arcuri said, referring to her romance with Johnson, which started in 2012 and ended in 2016, when he left City Hall.
When asked whether she loved Johnson, the 35-year-old said that she avoided thinking about it at the time.
“[…] I cared for him very deeply, but I never used the L word. I wouldn’t have recognised being in love. I cared very much about this man and I think that’s resolutely clear. That’s all I want to say”, Arcuri, who is currently married to a British businessman, stressed.
In an apparent nod to Johnson, she added that “you’d have to be a fool not to get swept away by those avalanches of passion, especially when you’re singled out as a young woman in London”.
The interview comes after Arcuri told the UK news outlet ITV in November 2019 that she had "a very special relationship" with Johnson while he served as mayor of London, but that she is “not going to answer the question” on whether it was actually an affair.
Earlier that year, the 35-year-old accused Johnson of treating her as "some one-night stand" ever since he assumed the office of the head of the UK government.
The scandal surfaced after The Sunday Times reported in late September 2019 that Arcuri had allegedly told four friends and a Tory activist that she was engaged in an intimate relationship with Johnson while he served as the mayor of London and was married to his erstwhile wife, Mariana Wheeler.
Both the prime minister and Arcuri have repeatedly denied misusing public funds during trade missions she attended or on funding her startup. Johnson avoided a criminal investigation after a UK police watchdog found no evidence to confirm the allegations.
