The Republicans’ third attempt to exclude Eric Ciotti rejected by the courts

The Paris judicial court declared Thursday June 27 inadmissible in summary proceedings the third attempt by the Les Républicains (LR) party to exclude its president Eric Ciotti, who concluded an electoral alliance with the National Rally (RN), rejecting the Republicans’ request to appoint an agent to this to replace him.

The court, seized via an emergency procedure, rejected the request signed by 703 members of the national council of the Republicans, who demanded the appointment of a representative to this if Eric Ciotti does not convene a new political office before Wednesday, 6:30 p.m.

“It appears from reading the table (…) that this number actually includes a large number of unsigned letters [et] that no verification of the payment of contributions by the signatories was carried out”observe le tribunal.

In a press release sent to Agence France-Presse, LR took « act » of the court decision, which he interprets as “a refusal to interfere in urgent political matters”considering that she “does not decide anything on the merits”.

“Mr. Ciotti’s refusal to recognize the obvious fact that his place is no longer with the Republicans, and his strategy of judicial obstruction will not prevent us from continuing our campaign throughout France for the qualification of our candidates for the second round.”adds the party.

Two days after the dissolution of the National Assembly, Eric Ciotti announced, to everyone’s surprise, an electoral alliance with the National Rally for the legislative elections, taking with him only one of the group’s 61 deputies.

“Anyway, he’s tied hand and foot. He can’t do anything.”explained to AFP a party official who recalls that Mr. Ciotti’s candidates registered under the name of his micro-party ” To the right “.

The party leadership has already called two political bureaus to exclude its president, but the courts ordered the suspension of these decisions on June 14. “until a decision is made [sur le] final background ».

Eric Ciotti’s first meeting for this campaign

For his part, Eric Ciotti, outgoing MP and candidate in the first constituency of the Alpes-Maritimes, called on his supporters in Nice on Thursday evening to “general mobilization” during the two rounds of elections to allow its alliance with the far right to “win, govern France and straighten it out”.

“I know you are proud and happy about the liberation of thought”he declared in front of some 300 people who came to the port of Nice for this first meeting since the announcement of his alliance, the details of which were only made public 30 minutes in advance.

After an offensive speech from his deputy Patrick Baqué, a surgeon from Nice who called for moving the “sanitary cordon” to fight against what he calls “the racist, anti-Semitic and anti-French left”Mr. Ciotti painted a gloomy picture of the situation in Nice and France in terms of public finances but also security and immigration.

Denouncing President Emmanuel Macron, “the man who was worth 1,000 billion euros in debt”the MP excluded the Macronist vote as an alternative. “Macronism is over. On Sunday, there will be a choice between the alliance of the right or the far left, Jean-Luc Mélenchon at Matignon, Sandrine Rousseau as Minister of the Interior, Rachel Keke as Minister of Culture.”he said.

“This is indecent and factually false,” replied his Macronist opponent in the constituency, Craig Monetti, also at a meeting at the same time. “There are a huge number of people from Nice and France who are republicans, progressives, democrats, centrists and who strongly reject the extremes.”

In the 2022 legislative elections, Mr. Ciotti, a member of parliament for the constituency since 2007, won nearly 32% of the vote in the first round against 26% for Mr. Monetti, and won with 56% of the vote in the second round. This year, the support of the RN and Reconquête could bring him closer to the 50% mark in the first round.