Hello, it’s lunchtime in Paris and president Emmanuel Macron is tasting local food with students in an agricultural high school refectory, in Ahun (Creuse department, Centre). He is trying to correct his image as a president who is far from his fellow citizens by making a two-day visit to two rural departments.
What happened during the weekend? Two more members of Le Rassemblement National, Marine Le Pen’s far-right party, joined her rival Eric Zemmour.
Why does it matter? After an impressive start in November and December, far-right candidate Eric Zemmour faces an uphill battle. He is lagging behind Marine Le Pen in most of the polls, and he needs to weaken her if he wants to have a chance to reach the second round of the presidential election.
On Saturday, the Socialist candidate Anne Hidalgo held a rally in Aubervilliers, a northern suburb of Paris. One week following the presentation of her presidential platform, the city of Paris mayor made the case of a battered social democracy. But almost only the rows of empty seats at the rally made the headlines.
The same day, a poll published by “Le Monde” showed that she was running neck to neck with Communist candidate Fabien Roussel (she was expected to get 3,5%, while he hovered at 2%). She is far behind left-center candidate Christiane Taubira (5%), who entered the race two weeks ago.
Such a low level of intentional votes is unprecedented in the history of Le Parti socialiste that ruled the left for almost half a century. It should scare everyone, but the fading Hidalgo campaign is like a slow-motion crash test. Or a train running wild out of its tracks with nobody paying attention. “Le Monde” reporter Laurent Telo, who covers her campaign, poetically summed up the situation last week. “Anne Hidalgo’s campaign team is making the noise of a lullaby,” he wrote.
What is truly astonishing is the “three most worrying” issues listed by people polled in our last survey are classic left-wing themes: purchasing power (44%) comes first in front of Covid (35%), health (29%), and climate change (28%). Hidalgo’s platform addresses all of them : she wants a 15% hike for the minimum wage (she wants also to cap the highest wages in private companies equal to 20 times the lowest wage). She envisions the creation of a unique department in charge of the economy and the environment. The money raised by a new tax on high incomes would finance the fight once morest global warming. She pleads to create a citizens initiative referendum the Yellow Jackets insurgents asked for in 2018.
It is as if le Parti Socialiste, torn between a pragmatical wing and a leftist one, and its candidate have a huge credibility problem. One of those responsible for this situation is former president François Hollande, who campaigned on the left before adopting center-right economic measures. Anne Hidalgo didn’t help when she repeatedly said, in 2020, that she would never run for president before doing so, and when she pleaded in December for a primary open to all left-wing candidates only to declare, less than a month following, she would not recognize its results (an online poll will crown a candidate next Sunday).
After years of defections, there is not a lot of meat left on the Socialist bone. Anne Hidalgo won the Socialists’ nomination, but only 22 480 members took part in the vote (the party had claimed 111 450 members in 2016). She got 15 335 votes. Leftist candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon (La France Insoumise), a former Socialist senator and former Socialist deputy minister for education, was the first big name to leave the party in 2008. Arnaud Montebourg, a former Socialist figure, also left the sinking ship – an independent candidate running for president, he withdrew from the race last week. Some former Socialists rebels are now helping center-left candidate Christiane Taubira or environmentalist candidate Yannick Jadot. Others definitively quit politics like the previous Socialist candidate in the 2017 presidential election, Benoît Hamon.
The 2022 prospects are dim for the Parti Socialiste. If Anne Hidalgo fails to gain 5% of the votes or more, her campaign won’t get any public funds dedicated for the electoral campaign. Bankruptcy may occur. Such political disaster surely will diminish its capacity to impose its candidates on safe left districts in the parliamentary elections this coming June. Le Parti Socialiste would then become a club of metropole mayors and presidents of regions without any national relevance.
Quote of the day
“A former president can very well return to politics”
The former Socialist president François Hollande (2012-2017) puzzled his party by saying that “a former president can very well return to politics, and it has happened, to be a candidate in the presidential election.” François Hollande made this comment when he met with students in a classroom earlier in the week. It appeared on TV on Sunday. Hollande had not been able to run for reelection in 2017 due to abyssal unpopularity and because his former advisor Emmanuel Macron had decided to declare his candidacy.
Number of the day
467,000
A total of 467,000 French citizens registered online to take part in a poll to decide which left-wing candidate stands in the presidential election. The outcome is bleak. However, as the major candidates, leftist Jean-Luc Mélenchon, Socialist Anne Hidalgo, and environmentalist Yannick Jadot have already announced that they will ignore its results. By way of comparison with a previous one, more than 2,000,000 citizens voted for the Socialist primary in 2017.
Countdown
76 Days until the presidential election’s first round
90 Days until the presidential election’s second round
Thanks for reading, see you tomorrow
