A year and a half before the 2026 municipal elections, LFI leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon said he did not want to ally with the socialists. The leading candidate is not yet known. This time, the party wishes to conquer more of the Ile-de-France towns.
Is the line definitively broken between socialists and rebels for the 2026 municipal elections in Paris? For the leader of La France Insoumise, Jean-Luc Mélenchon, there is no question of supporting Rémi Féraud, the socialist candidate pushed by Anne Hidalgo.
“They can insult us from morning to evening, as the abject Mr. Rémi Féraud does, saying that he will not make an alliance with people who are anti-Semitic. Mr. Féraud, now, this evening, you know a thing, you cannot be the mayor of Paris because you will not have us with you, neither in the first nor in the second round,” said Jean-Luc Mélenchon on Friday November 29 during a conference.
A reciprocal opinion, shared by Emmanuel Grégoire, also a socialist candidate for the Paris municipal elections, who does not want a common candidate with LFI. “Yes, I automatically exclude them. It’s a conflict of values. Consistency means going without them,” declared the Paris MP on November 26.
Conquer Paris and beyond
LFI is determined to campaign in the capital. It is the name of Sophia Chikirou which comes back insistently to embody this rebellious list, even if nothing has yet been decided. The Paris MP showed her difference again recently by publicly criticizing the policy pursued by the mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo.
If LFI has views on Paris, the rebels also have views on many cities in the Ile-de-France region. The LFI leadership ticked off 18 cities in Île-de-France, according to the party's strategic orientation text, in particular popular communes such as Saint-Denis, Bobigny, Trappes and La Courneuve.
These are cities where La France Insoumise achieved significant results in the European elections. “There are things to do,” a rebellious elected official told BFM Paris Île-de-France. In each of these communes, the party will wage battle as in Etampes where premises have been purchased.
A strategy that breaks with that implemented in 2020, because LFI now wishes to consolidate its local roots. This new stage will begin on December 14 with the representative assembly of La France insoumise. The line to adopt and the objectives will be decided there.
A future national agreement with the NFP?
The result of the 2023 senatorial elections also weighs in this decision. “This is also how we will allow the entry of rebellious France into the Senate, after having been prevented from doing so by the national leaderships of the Socialist Party and the Communist Party in 2023,” assures the strategic orientation text. “We will no longer be second knives,” assures a rebellious elected official from the Ile-de-France region to BFM Paris Île-de-France.
However, the party is open to agreements. “We will propose a national agreement to our partners of the New Popular Front. In the event that this does not succeed, we will work where possible on local or departmental agreements with one or more components of the NFP”, notes the guidance text.
Local strategies will be developed from February. The heads of the lists for towns with more than 50,000 inhabitants will be designated between March and June. According to a recent Ifop-Fiducial poll for Le Figaro, Sophia Chikirou is credited with around 10% of the votes in Paris, in several scenarios.
Nicolas Dumas with Emma Forton
