Macron “castigates the extremes” and refuses to resign

Emmanuel Macron declared Thursday evening that he would appoint “in the coming days” a Prime Minister responsible for forming a “government of general interest”, the day after the historic censorship of Michel Barnier which he blamed for an “anti-republican front » between “the extreme right and the extreme left”.

In a ten-minute televised speech from the Elysée, the head of state for the first time outlined a mea culpa on the dissolution of the National Assembly decided in June, which plunged the country into crisis. It “was not understood”, “many blamed me” and “it’s my responsibility”, he admitted.

On the other hand, he refused to assume “the irresponsibility” of “parliamentarians who consciously chose to bring down the budget and the government of France a few days before the Christmas holidays”. To the calls for resignation emanating from La France insoumise and, in a more subdued manner, from the National Rally (RN), Emmanuel Macron responded that he would exercise his mandate “fully until its end” in 2027.

Faced with this new impasse, while the appointment of Matignon’s successor had been planned for this Thursday, Emmanuel Macron once again procrastinated. “I will appoint a Prime Minister in the coming days. I will charge him with forming a government of general interest representing all the political forces in an arc of government who can participate in it or, at the very least, who undertake not to censor it,” he promised. , without further details.

This Executive will have as a “priority” the “budget”, which could not be adopted under the leadership of the outgoing team. Starting with a “special law” tabled in Parliament “before mid-December” to ensure “continuity” of state financing based on the budget for the current year.

During the day, the president had received the resignation of Michel Barnier, overthrown the day before by 331 deputies and now holder of the unenviable record for brevity at Matignon under the V^e Republic. The president “took note” of it, charging him with handling current affairs while waiting for a successor. Above all, he had lunch with his ally François Bayrou, whose name is insistently circulating for Matignon with that of the indestructible Macronist Minister of the Armed Forces Sébastien Lecornu.

Other names are cited, from the president of Hauts-de-France Xavier Bertrand to the mayor of Troyes François Baroin, both members of the Les Républicains party.

Emmanuel Macron is “the cause of the problem” and “will go away by the force of events”, reacted the rebellious leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon on TF1 after the speech. The boss of the Ecologists, Marine Tondelier, welcomed “good news” on X: “The President of the Republic has not hastily appointed a Prime Minister who is even more right-wing.”

“This president does not speak the same language as his people,” RN spokesperson Julien Odoul also judged on the same social network. According to two Odoxa and Elabe polls published Thursday, the French were divided on the motion of censure, but 6 out of 10 called for the resignation of Emmanuel Macron.

At the RN, if Marine Le Pen has not formally called for a resignation from the president, she believes that “the pressure” on her “will obviously be increasingly strong” if “we do not take the path of respect for voters” .

Lucie Castets, candidate in Matignon for the New Popular Front last summer, said Thursday evening that she was “extremely shocked” by Emmanuel Macron’s declarations concerning “an anti-republican front”.

“I had the impression of a President of the Republic who is at the same time head of everything but responsible for nothing,” she declared on the sidelines of a trip to Tours.

“I am also extremely shocked by the fact that the President of the Republic declares that the left-wing forces, who voted for censorship, have created an anti-Republican front, when we remember how many Macronist deputies were elected, thanks to the Republican roadblock,” she continued.