Cinemas have just reopened and are teeming with new films.
Meanwhile, at Les Républicains, we decided instead to immerse ourselves in the rehabilitation of an old controversial soap opera from the early 2010s: that of the "ni-ni".
At the time, it was Nicolas Sarkozy head of state who had imposed a doctrine of no choice: in the event of a left-FN second round in the cantonal elections, ban on calling to vote for one or the other.
This year, it was psychodrama in the Paca region - where the outgoing LR Renaud Muselier made an alliance with LREM in the 1st round - which brought the subject back to the table. Considering themselves betrayed, several LR executives have let it be known that, if led to vote, they would refuse to choose Muselier. No question of calling to vote against the RN, possible winner. A new "ni-ni". Thus Éric Ciotti, deputy of the Alpes-Maritimes, Guillaume Peltier, deputy vice-president of the party, or François-Xavier Bellamy, leader of the LR MEPs.
If the situation in Paca remains in the throat of the right, this non-choice carried as a standard has caused several ulcers at the party's headquarters, rue de Vaugirard. Last Tuesday in the strategic committee, the boss of LR, Christian Jacob, went to the front. "There is a red line that will never be crossed, there will never be any ambiguity with the FN
(Editor's note: RN)
as long as I am president of the party", he argued, specifying that he had disciplined himself not to answer on the subject in the media and that he would have "waited for all to do the same thing". In short: it was better to be silent. This update also comes as in recent weeks, certain remarks made by Eric Ciotti to Nadine Morano have suggested a certain vagueness on the relationship with the party of Marine Le Pen.
Divided over his strategy of winning back
During the strategic committee, several executives raised their voices.
"I indicated that we cannot put LREM and the RN on the same level," says the deputy (LR) of Oise, Eric Woerth, present at the meeting.
Whatever the facade evolutions, the RN remains a lure, a danger for France.
"Opinion shared by his colleague Jean-François Copé, who deplores that some in his party" are putting Macron and Le Pen back to back ".
Unacceptable, "even if we fight Macron on a number of subjects" for the mayor of Meaux.
And former apostle of the “ni-ni” 2011 version.
But if at the time Cope justified his position by recalling that the PS was allied with "the extreme left", here the situation is different.
Renaud Muselier remains LR, and, more generally, if the party tries to cultivate its difference with Macron, claims a status of “first opponent”, the ideological proximity with LREM is real.
The subject could come back to the table between the regional rounds.
Read alsoRegional: the “Morano-Ciotti” operation of the RN and LREM
So, how to combine opposition to both RN and LREM, without putting them "at the same level"? Above all, not all LRs place the cursor at the same distance from the two competitors; this is what Jacob recalled. Where Guillaume Peltier, his number 2, who prided himself (like Ciotti) of not having voted for Macron or Le Pen in 2017, pleads for a “tactical and strategic clarity” which places him at an equal distance from the two. If not further from En Marche. The dilemma, on the right, seems insoluble, for the simple reason that not everyone, like Jacob the Chiraquian, has the same level of “allergy” to RN. But also because the party remains deeply divided on its strategy of reconquest: should we first seek out the voters who left for Emmanuel Macron or on the contrary those seduced by Marine Le Pen? Here again,the opinions of executives are deeply divergent.
The best way to prevent the party from tearing itself apart over this new "ni-ni"? Jean-François Copé draws the obvious: “To have a credible candidate, capable of being qualified in the second round of the presidential election. But then who, when, and how to designate it? Again on the right, the soap opera goes on forever.
