POLITICS – LREM saves the furniture. Sunday June 12, 2022, in the first round of the legislative elections, the presidential party united under the banner “Together” obtained 25.7% of the votes at the national level, neck and neck but very slightly ahead of NUPES (25.6%). , according to the almost final results published by the Ministry of the Interior.
However, the second round projections made in the evening by various polling institutes suggest a National Assembly without a very clear majority. While the threshold is 289 seats, the average of these projections gives LREM and its allies 281.
Back to a dull campaign, started very late and filled with political errors. After his re-election on April 24, Emmanuel Macron made the choice to give time to time, in a legislative campaign historically longer than the others, two and a half months. The president takes three weeks before announcing his choice of prime minister on May 16. It will be a woman, which has not happened since 1991. Elisabeth Borne takes the head of the government, after the refusal of other candidates.
One month to form a government
She who dedicated her appointment “to all little girls” is immediately entangled in the Damien Abad affair which pollutes the sequence of the announcement of a new government. The only surprise – the researcher Pap Ndiaye at the National Education, which arouses criticism and questions after a five-year term carried by Jean-Michel Blanquer, on an opposite line – is quickly erased by an article from Médiapart on Damien Abad. The only take from the right of the president, the former president of the LR group in the Assembly is appointed Minister of Solidarity, Autonomy and People with Disabilities. He was overtaken by rape charges the next day and caught up in turmoil for more than a week.
The government, left in the front line by an Emmanuel Macron voluntarily in withdrawal, seems frozen. Few announcements, few media interventions. A non-campaign. For its part, the Nupes of Jean-Luc Mélenchon plows the ground, brings out its proposals and imposes itself as the first force of opposition to the president.
Contested appointments
Macronie, which had promised a “common house” from the start of the 2021 school year to bring together its different sensibilities, does not succeed, but presents itself under the banner “Together” which brings together the MoDem, Horizons, LREM, Agir and Territories of Progress. On May 5, four men, on stage, present their new coalition. A taste of the old world far removed from the Revolution promised by Emmanuel Macron in his 2017 book and his two major successive five-year causes on gender equality.
Five days later, on May 10, the 577 investitures of Ensemble for the legislative elections were announced. Among them, a candidate sentenced by the courts for domestic violence – Jérôme Peyrat, forced to give up – others prosecuted for moral harassment by parliamentary collaborators. “Move around, there is nothing to see”, replies in essence the general delegate of En Marche, Stanislas Guérini, as you can see in the video below.
Abad affair, fiasco of the Stade de France…
The troubles continue with the fiasco of the Champions League final at the Stade de France on May 28. The testimonies of English spectators or observers, shocked after the use of tear gas or attacked near the Stade de France are relayed throughout the world; the explanations of the Minister of the Interior who refers the responsibility “to the English supporters” are struggling to convince. Gérald Darmanin is summoned before the Senate on June 1, with the barely appointed Minister of Sports Amélie Oudéa-Castéra. Macron still remains outside the fray, leaving an Elisabeth Borne alone who does not go to the front.
There are two weeks left in the campaign, the Nupes is credited with 26% of the vote, neck and neck with the presidential party made up of MoDem, Horizons, Agir and Territories of progress. Macronie is beginning to think that it must reinvest in the countryside. On May 30, Elisabeth Borne summons her troops by video and calls for mobilization. In Point, it announces an “exceptional law” to reduce fossil fuels, a way to recover points on its environmentalist wing, embodied by Nupes. A law on purchasing power has been announced, but the government does not want to reveal the amount of the much-awaited food check before the legislative elections. A minimal campaign.
On June 2, President Macron resumed his travels and went to Marseille, his city of hearts, accompanied by his Minister of Education Pap Ndiaye who remained discreet. The next day, the president gave an interview to the regional daily press to relaunch a tentative campaign. What do we remember? That he does not feel obliged to appoint Jean-Luc Mélenchon to Matignon if he wins the majority. Way to give him the point. “No political party can impose a name on the president”, declares Emmanuel Macron who returns the RN and the Nupes back to back with this formula: “disorder and submission”.
Abroad, Valls eliminated; la Nupes in ambush
From June 5, the result of the French abroad sounds like an alert. Former Prime Minister Manuel Valls, invested by LREM, is eliminated in the first round in the 5th constituency of Spain and Portugal. On the spot, one criticizes the party of the president to forget its promises of renewal. In most constituencies, Together comes first in nine constituencies out of eleven, but is closely followed by Nupes which qualifies in the second round in ten constituencies out of eleven. A signal that Macronie does not take into account.
Emmanuel Macron’s promises on a new mode of governance, based on listening, do not appear. Although he announced on June 3 a “National Council for Refoundation”, inspired by the National Council of Resistance, in the columns of the Regional Daily Press, the too vague concept does not convince and is mocked by the opposition. .
Five days before the first round, on June 7, Elisabeth Borne gives a final interview to France Bleu, but does not show empathy when a disabled woman questions her about the deconjugalization of the allowance she would need so as not to depend on her husband. Outcry in opposition. “Indignity”, judge LR. The popularity of the Prime Minister is not high: 20% favorable opinions according to our YouGov barometer, on June 10. Far behind his predecessor Jean Castex at more than 30%.
Blanquer eliminated, Montchalin in difficulty
Three days before the election, during a final trip to the Tarn, the president was grabbed by a high school student who asked him “You put at the head of the state men accused of rape and violence against women. Why?”. Emmanuel Macron answers “presumption of innocence”. The next day, the young woman receives a visit from the gendarmes in her high school on the grounds of her question to the president. An outrageous visit. The gendarmerie apologizes and on Saturday June 11, the day before the ballot, Laura’s question is taken up in a loop on social networks. The great cause of the quinquennium is not forgotten by the voters. In Ain, Sunday June 12, Damien Abad still arrives in the lead, very close to winning Sunday June 19.
At the end of an unprecedented ballot – it is the first time that an outgoing president has been re-elected since the five-year term of the year 2000 and the reversal of the calendar with the legislative elections – Emmanuel Macron therefore comes in second position. Figures of his majority are in difficulty, such as the ex-minister Jean-Michel Blanquer, eliminated in the first round or Amélie de Montchalin, Minister of Ecological Transition, in great difficulty in Essonne. The week-long whirlwind campaign will be key for the President and his troops if they want to retain an absolute majority.