Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin announced Thursday his candidacy for the legislative elections in the 10th district of the North, which includes part of the city of Tourcoing, of which he was mayor.
"After talking about it with the President of the Republic, I decided (...) to be a candidate next June," declared Mr. Darmanin during a press conference in Bousbecque (North).
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His deputy will be outgoing deputy Vincent Ledoux, a member of the right-wing pro-Macron “Agir” party, who could keep his chair if Mr. Darmanin were elected and reappointed to government.
"Vincent is an excellent deputy (...) If I came, it's because he asked me to," assured the Minister of the Interior.
“It was quite logical that after five years, I do not hide, that I go to see the voters.
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“I will not oppose him”
The potential LR candidate in the constituency, Claudine Hue, present at the press conference, announced that she was going to "support" him.
"I'm not going to oppose him," she added.
Gérald Darmanin, then still a member of the UMP, was elected in 2012 in the same constituency.
But he resigned in January 2016, due to multiple mandates, after Xavier Bertrand's victory in the regional elections in Hauts-de-France.
He then became vice-president of the regional executive, until his appointment in the first government of Edouard Philippe in 2017 and his membership of La République en Marche.
Vincent Ledoux replaced him in the National Assembly in March 2016, after a large victory under the LR label in the second round of a partial legislative against a candidate from the National Front.
A year later, he was re-elected for 5 years.
At the end of 2017, Mr. Ledoux had joined the new pro-Macron right-wing party, "Agir", presented as an alternative to LR.