The left withdraws by surprise and at the last minute the proposal to abolish bullfighting in France

The French left has withdrawn this Thursday

and by surprise the bill to abolish bullfights in the ten provinces where they are legal.

The deputy responsible for the initiative, the animal activist Aymeric Caron, justified the decision on the grounds that there were hundreds of amendments, so many that, according to Caron, it would have taken a continuous 24-hour debate to debate and vote on all of them on time.

The regulation set a deadline at midnight, impossible to meet.

"I surrender to the evidence: we will not be able to abolish the bullfight today," said Caron, a deputy for Paris, in the chamber.

He continued: “Soon the bullfight will be abolished in this country.

I promise.

We promise".

And he concluded, between a hubbub of shouts and invectives from the benches of the center and the right: "I withdraw the text."

The announcement turned the script of an afternoon and a night upside down that promised long and heated debates, after a week in which bullfighting —a very minority hobby in France and already prohibited in the entire country except in the southern regions— dominated a good part of of the media and political space.

Those who defended the protection of animals and their dignity, and the defenders of local traditions and cultures, clashed.

74% of French people are in favor of banning bullfighting, according to a survey by the Ifop institute.

The debate, since Caron presented the law in the summer, has gone beyond bullfighting.

Divisions surfaced between northern and southern France, between urban and rural.

All the parties, except La Francia Insumisa (LFI), to which Caron is attached, divided.

On Wednesday, President Emmanuel Macron declared: "It is not the priority of the moment."

The

was one of the laws that LFI planned to propose in the so-called “parliamentary niche”.

In the National Assembly, each opposition group has reserved one day a year, and only that day, to set the agenda.

For the rebels, Jean-Luc Mélenchon's game was on Thursday.

That is why you could not debate or vote beyond midnight from Thursday to Friday.

Abortion, in the Constitution

What happened was that the debates on the first initiative of the day —a proposal to inscribe the right to abortion in the Constitution and thus protect it for the future— lasted all morning and until around 5:00 p.m.

The abortion rights proposal was a resounding success for LFI: it was adopted with 337 votes in favour, 32 against, with 18 abstentions.

Among the favorable votes were those of the Macronist bench, the largest in the Assembly, and some from the extreme right, a reflection of the broad consensus on the right to abortion in France.

Now it must go to the Senate, controlled by the conservative opposition.

"I am angry: I would have liked to go to the end of the debate," said Patrick Vignal, a deputy for Renaissance, President Macron's party, in the corridors of the Assembly.

Vignal had signed some of the amendments to obstruct the vote.

"It is the parliamentary game," he defended himself.

"What bothers me about my colleague Caron is that he doesn't know how Parliament works or how the law works."

Caron, a journalist by profession and a well-known anti-species activist, is a rookie at the Palacio Borbón, the seat of the Chamber: he was elected for the first time in the June legislatures.

Vignal recalled that, in the face of the frustrated pension reform in 2020, LFI and the rest of the opposition presented tens of thousands of amendments to obstruct the process.

Deputy Caron has failed in his initiative, but has put the debate in the public arena and has multiplied its presence on television and radio.

He has even published a book.

“Something has happened: many people have become aware.

[This proposal] has advanced the cultural battle, the battle of civilization, ”he declared as he left the chamber.

“Something started today.

Now we know that the bullfight will be abolished in France.

It's a matter of time".

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