Legislative elections 2024: in Brest-center, the revenge of Pierre-Yves Cadalen?

Clearly the favourite to become MP for Brest-centre (Brest left bank, Guilers, Bohars, Gouesnou) on 7 July, Pierre-Yves Cadalen prefers to remain cautious as the disillusionment of June 19, 2022 was painful: he was beaten by 118 votes in the second round. So the doctor in political science surveys the ground in these last days of the campaign. “It’s about convincing until the end”smiles the candidate of the New Popular Front whose task is this time facilitated by the absence of dissident candidacy on the left.

“The choice facing the country is either a positive majority, from all the lefts, to pursue a policy that has not been implemented for a long time and which is entirely in line with our republican motto of liberty, equality, fraternity. Or to plunge into chaos with the National Rally. So from the first round, we must send a strong message.”

The rebel finds himself for the third time facing Jean-Charles LarsonneurMP since 2017. And who would like to see himself once again thwarting the predictions : “Never two without three !”

The former walker, who then passed through the Agir and Horizons groups, now sits with the non-registered. The 40-year-old Brestois has been walking alone since December 2023 and his vote against the Immigration law in the Assembly. Not necessarily an advantage in this crucial election where everyone is invited to choose their side… but the candidate from the center defends his freedom and his record: “I have never obtained as many things for the constituency as since I became independent. It should not happen like that, but obviously this power respects more the people who have a little guts and who dare to say the things”.

A position castigated by the official candidate of the face-to-face majority: Tristan Brehier28 ans. “When we are without a label, without a group in the Assembly, we are isolated and that does not allow us to have sufficient political weight to represent the constituency, which needs it”tackles this faithful of the macronie who willingly highlights the figure of Gabriel Attal, whose elements of language he adopted.

“It is a clarification electionhe recites. There are three blocs, and I hope that the central bloc will be represented at the end of the first round on Sunday.”. A modest hope that says everything about the crumbling of the presidential camp, which convinced only 15.14% of voters in the European elections in this 2nd constituency of Finistère, where the RN collected 21.74% of the ballots. Unlike Pierre-Yves Cadalen, Tristan Bréhier does not dramatize the threat of the extreme right. “I think there is already enough worry, doubt and questioning among citizens to bring back stress”. He prefers to calmly put forward his proposals, such as his idea of ​​a student lease at a moderate rent, in exchange for tax advantages for owners. It remains to be seen whether this will be enough to do better than the 13.57% of Marc Coatanéa, also invested by Ensemble in 2022.

Unknown in the local political arena, Denis Kervella represents the National Rally in Brest-center. At 67, this former departmental director of the Banque de France is participating in his first election. “I am not fooled, it is the national dynamic that will make me perhaps in the second round, not me personally”recognizes the man who describes himself as a man of conviction, a fine connoisseur of the economic world. He intends to take advantage of the Jordan Bardella effect to compensate for his lack of activists and notoriety and to make his way to the second round. Without really campaigning.

The other candidates in the 2nd constituency of Finistère : Françoise Houard (Les Républicains), Martial Koffi (without label), Alain Rousseau (Reconquête), Rémy Collard (Lutte Ouvrière), Geneviève Henry (Ecologie au Center), Melvyn Hita (Décidons Nous-Nous/Decidemos).