The formula that imposed itself came from the mouth of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the first name cited, especially by the adversaries of the left, even if the former presidential candidate has withdrawn from parliamentary life. To a question about his desire to apply to Matignon, he replied “I feel capable”. Thus opening a ball of cautious suitors: “why not”, “I’m one of them”…
1 Jean-Luc Mélenchon, essential or not?
He feels “capable”. The rebellious tribune, in addition to a circle of devoted supporters, has his experience on his side: a former minister under Jospin, several times a parliamentarian and a presidential candidate who reached 22%.
“I do not eliminate myself, but I do not impose myself,” repeats Mr. Mélenchon, also citing other rebels like Manuel Bompard or Mathilde Panot.
But he has almost the entire rest of the New Popular Front against him, including the leaders of the communist, environmentalist and socialist parties. Like former president François Hollande. Enough to make some Rebels cringe. “I can take you to places where people will say ‘not the socialists, not François Hollande’”, underlines one executive.
2 Hollande, Vallaud, Rabault… PS old and new
In the event of a victory for the New Popular Front, the equation seems difficult for François Hollande, given how hostile the Insoumis are to his legacy.
But in the event of an Assembly blocked by the absence of a clear majority? “I think that the role of personalities like me, given the positions I have held, will be to find solutions,” cleverly slipped Emmanuel Macron’s predecessor, without specifying which position he was thinking of.
If First Secretary Olivier Faure has not come forward, some socialists are cautiously coming out of the woodwork.
Valérie Rabault, former head of the socialist deputies, vice-president of the Assembly and expert on economic issues, argued for a female candidate, citing the PS president of Occitanie Carole Delga, the rebellious LFI deputy Clémentine Autain, and “why not” herself. Sometimes at loggerheads with the Insoumis, her name had circulated in the press in 2022 for Matignon.
His successor at the head of the socialist group, the Landes MP Boris Vallaud, a graduate of the ENA and deputy secretary of the Élysée under François Hollande, also put himself in the running with a pun: “I think the formula is ‘I feel capable of it’? Well, there you go.”
3 The Ruffin hypothesis, other outsiders?
“I feel capable of it,” assumed the figure of Picardie Debout, former deputy of the LFI group, using the same term as Jean-Luc Mélenchon. The founder of La France insoumise is an “obstacle” to the victory of the left according to François Ruffin. War seems to have been declared between the two men.
The outgoing deputy for the Somme would necessarily come up against the hostility of Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s supporters. And could the founder of the newspaper “Fakir”, radical on social and fiscal issues, lead a recomposed, or even refocused, left?
“The two legs of the (recomposed) left are François Ruffin and Raphaël Glucksmann,” believes the PS mayor of Rouen, Nicolas Mayer-Rossignol.
Raphaël Glucksmann has excluded himself from the race while placing a surprise proposal: the former secretary general of the CFDT, Laurent Berger. “He is used to managing very important files, to leading difficult negotiations and under pressure,” believes an environmentalist source, without going too far. “In any case, it is not my desire,” assured Laurent Berger.
4 And among the communists or the ecologists?
“I am part of it like others,” Fabien Roussel, head of the PCF, soberly judged. “If tomorrow we do not have an absolute majority, we will also have to be able to work with others who are not of our sensibility,” he estimated.
Prominently present during the family photo of the New Popular Front, the former Green presidential candidate Yannick Jadot dodges the question with a smile.
