British Prime Minister Boris Johnson vowed Tuesday to defy a last-minute law requiring him to seek an extension of the upcoming Brexit deadline.

The law, passed after Johnson moved to temporarily suspend Parliament until the middle of October, requires the Prime Minister to seek an extension to the deadline for negotiating an exit agreement with the EU if no such agreement has been reached by October 19. The current deadline is October 31. Johnson has repeatedly criticized the law, stating that it would tie Britain’s hands in negotiations with the EU. However, the House of Commons was able to successfully seize control of the agenda and force through the law last week. Johnson called for a snap general election to try to win more support in the House of Commons but was unable to muster the two-thirds majority required by the Fixed Term Parliaments Act to call for a new election.

In a speech during the prorogation ceremony to close the parliamentary session, Johnson promised that he would negotiate an exit treaty with the EU but would remain fully prepared to walk away if he could not do so regardless of the law. “This government will not delay Brexit any further,” he stated, continuing that his government would not allow “the emphatic verdict of the referendum to be slowly suffocated by further calculated grift and paralysis.” According to legal professionals interviewed by The Guardian, Johnson would most likely be guilty of contempt if he attempted to circumvent the law by either refusing to seek a delay after October 19 or by asking EU delegates to reject an extension request. Criminal Bar Association chair Caroline Goodwin said that it was imperative that Johnson follow the law’s explicit instructions to obtain an extension should negotiations fail, saying that it would be impossible to “expect people not to rob, rape and murder when a government declares it may break the law.”

The prorogation ceremony was interrupted repeatedly by protests from opposition MPs, including waving signs reading “Silenced” and attempting to physically prevent Speaker of the House John Bercow from leaving his seat in an effort to stop him from completing the prorogation. Bercow himself called the suspension of Parliament an outrage, stating that it is “not typical” and that “it represents not just in the minds of some colleagues but huge numbers of people outside, an act of executive fiat.” Bercow also announced that he would step down as Speaker on October 31, the same day as the current Brexit deadline.