“We are on the ground, meeting, including in this period of political uncertainty,” argued Mr. Bardella upon arriving in front of the Monsieur Madame restaurant.
Outside, around a hundred people wait in single file, some with the French flag on their shoulders, others displaying the work that Mr. Bardella has been initialing from town to town for a month.
A way of calibrating his popularity, at a time when his party has made the crucial decision to press the censorship button, thus hoping to satisfy the expectations of its supporters.
“The choice we made is a choice of responsibility because we could not leave a budget which provided for 40 billion in taxes in the long term (…) which was going to weaken growth and attractiveness of the country,” said Mr. Bardella before beginning his signing session.
“Two thirds of the voters of the National Rally were in favor of this censorship. I could not look at the voters and tell them that I let 40 billion in additional taxes and increased electricity taxes go through, and the reimbursement of medicines in the current context is not possible,” he argued, an hour before the verdict was rendered.
For Myriam Bouzeggou, 20, a firefighter in the Paris region, this censorship was “essential”.
Even “necessary” according to Keliane Ferragu, 19, National Rally activist and business student. “We have a government which for three months has had no legitimacy to be in power, Mr. Barnier, from a party which won 4% in the legislative elections, has no legitimacy in the eyes of the French”, a- he explained to AFP.
The young man thinks that Mr. Bardella, with “his career, his oratorical art”, can restore the image of a France which is not afraid to “claim its patriotism”.
Dove Scetbon, 56, a salesman who has “never voted in his life”, says he is ready to do so for the National Rally. “I think that a boy like that, young, with ideas, could perhaps move the country forward compared to the kind of people who are in the Assembly today,” he pleads.
