Sébastien Chenu, one of the most influential leaders of Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National, widely re-elected in the first round last night, declared on France 2 that if the RN obtains a relative majority but has sufficient support, it will govern. In recent days, on several occasions, the candidate for prime minister Jordan Bardella had insisted that he would accept the post only with an absolute majority that would allow him to bring about “change” in the country. “We will have to see how the National Assembly organizes itself,” Chenu said, “but we will assume our responsibilities to the French.”
Chenu added that Macron no longer represents the majority of the French: “He is extremely in the minority in the country. Constitutionally, he is legitimate. But if he were to find himself facing an ungovernable House or if he were in a situation where he could not appoint a prime minister because there is no majority, then he would be in a complicated situation. He would be forced to resign.” Jordan Bardella – candidate for prime minister and Marine Le Pen’s heir – has released his “letter to the French”, in which he launches an appeal “to make the choice of a responsible change”. The vote has highlighted – Bardella writes – “a level of historic participation” and from the first round “two clear choices” emerge.
Between these two, “the far left represents an existential threat to the French nation”. For Bardella, next Sunday’s runoff must be a duel between the RN and the New Popular Front, for which he imposes on his readers the face of Jean-Luc Mélenchon: “You cannot entrust the fate of France to these arsonists who adopt a strategy of permanent conflict”, he writes. No mention, in the letter, of Emmanuel Macron’s Ensemble coalition.
