In a stunning development that sent shock waves across Paris, the leader of the centre-right Republicans has backed an alliance with Marine Le Pen’s populist Rally National party in early elections called by President Emmanuel Macron.
of Quarantine Line The “National Rally siege” that has surrounded the party for decades may “disappear,” as Republican leader Eric Ciotti said on Tuesday he was abandoning his party’s long-held position not to work with the National Rally in favor of forming an electoral coalition that could fundamentally change France’s political landscape.
“I believe we need to serve a country in crisis,” Ciotti said. Pronounced according to FigaroHe warned that on the political left there was an “unnatural alliance of traitors” who defended “ideas that border on anti-Semitism”, as well as “the Macron faction who have led the country to where it is today”.
Therefore, he argued, for centre-right parties to maintain their influence and get the country back on the right track, “we need to remain who we are and form an alliance… with the National Rally.”
French member of parliament Eric Ciotti (Republicans, right-wing opposition party) answers questions from a group of journalists in front of him in the “Hall of the Four Colonnes” on May 28, 2024. (Photo by Amaury Cornu/Hans Lukas/Hans Lukas via AFP) (Photo by Amaury Cornu/Hans Lukas/AFP via Getty Images)
“I hope that my political family, who have been sitting on the sidelines since 2012 and watching the country decline, can form a large group in Parliament,” the LR chairman added.
a vote According to the report, released on Monday, shortly after President Macron called for early parliamentary elections following his party’s humiliating defeat to Le Pen in the European Parliament elections, the RN currently has the support of 34 percent of the public in the June 30 general election and is on track to secure a majority of 235 to 265 seats in the National Assembly.
This falls short of the 289 seats required for an absolute majority. But if the Republicans, who currently hold 61 seats in the French parliament, go ahead with Ciotti’s coalition proposal, a right-wing coalition would likely win. If that happens, Macron would be forced to choose between appointing Jordan Bardella, leader of the National Rally party, as prime minister to form a “coexistence” government, or resigning and calling early presidential elections.
Macron loses big Euro election to populist Le Pen, immediately dissolves parliament and calls general elections https://t.co/qfYuRUgOGk
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) June 9, 2024
Former presidential candidate and Republican leader in the National Assembly, Le Pen, praised the LR leader’s “courageous choice” to support the League and said Ciotti had shown “responsibility”, adding that “40 years of pseudo-quarantine measures that have led to so many electoral defeats are disappearing.”
Jordan Bardella (28), leader of the National Rally and the party’s candidate for prime minister, said: “By responding to the call for unity, Eric Ciotti is putting the interests of the French people above political parties. Let’s work together to fight the chaos of immigration, restore authority and order and support the purchasing power of French people. Unity is what shapes France.”
But Mr Ciotti’s statement has caused divisions within his own centre-right party, with even Olivier Mallet, leader of the Republicans in the National Assembly, calling on Mr Ciotti to step down as leader. Bruno Littell, head of the Republicans group in the Senate, also claimed he had not been consulted about the announcement, saying “a party is not just about one person”.
Jordan Bardella (centre), leader of France’s National Rally (RN) party and leading MEP, speaks to media outside the RN party headquarters in Paris on June 10, 2024, the day after the European Parliament elections. (Alain Jocard/AFP) (Alain Jocard/AFP via Getty Images)
Former National Front presidential candidate Michel Barnier, best known as the EU’s chief Brexit negotiator, said he supported “responsibility, order in the streets, public accounting, borders and social progress” but was opposed to working with “populist, anti-European parties.”
Visibly panicked by the possibility of an RN-LR agreement, Macron’s Interior Minister Gérard Darmanin likened the move to the signing of the Munich Agreement with Nazi Germany in 1938, saying: “Mr Ciotto has brought shame on the Gaullist family by kissing Marine Le Pen… It is shameful. French people, wake up!”
But Ciotti has received some support for the pact with the RN from Guillem Carayon, chairman of the party’s Young Republican activist wing. To tell“Together with Eric Ciotti and thousands of Le République activists, we choose courage and common sense.”
Carayon noted that the National Assembly was “the choice approved by millions of French people” in the European elections, adding: “We must listen to the voices of those who can no longer tolerate Macron’s policies. France first, France always.”
Panic in Paris as Macron’s ‘suicidal’ early elections pave the way for populist right’s power grabhttps://t.co/L4dZqqQL9E
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) June 11, 2024
But the budding alliance with the center-right appears to have come at the cost of an alliance with former presidential candidate and author Eric Zemmour’s right-wing, anti-mass immigration Reconquisté party.
On Monday, Marion Maréchal, Leconquet’s leading candidate and Marine Le Pen’s estranged niece, took the unilateral step of meeting with her aunt and Bardella in Paris, without Zemmour, in the hope of uniting the right in the upcoming elections.
Zemmour said he intended to draw the 1.4 million people who supported him in the EU elections into the national rally, despite them having been excluded from earlier talks. To tell He said a “major rally for victory” was needed, in light of the “Popular Front” alliance announced by the far-left on Monday.
Marion Maréchal, candidate for the French Reconquité party’s leadership, speaks to media personnel in front of the National Rally (RN) party headquarters in Paris on June 10, 2024, after meeting with Marine Le Pen and Jordan Bardella, the day after the European Parliament elections. (Photo by Adnan Farzat/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
But excluding Zemmour from any potential coalition government appears to have been a prerequisite for the larger Republican parties to back Le Pen.
in statement Marechal, who was released after Ciotti’s announcement, said on Tuesday: “Jordan Bardella informed me this afternoon of the change in position and that the RN has rejected the very principle of the agreement. Unfortunately, despite attempts to negotiate, the assertion was that the RN does not want any direct or indirect association with Eric Zemmour.”
“This is obviously a huge disappointment for France. We sincerely hope that the refusal to form a real coalition government does not lead to another victory for Emmanuel Macron’s coalition, or even worse, a victory for a left-wing and far-left coalition.”
Exclusive: From Brigitte Bardot to the burkini, MEP claims mass immigration is destroying France’s ‘way of life’https://t.co/bGCwJoV4e1
— Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) June 7, 2024
