Under pressure from the government which accuses her of wanting to push “France into the abyss”, even of “bluffing” or playing into the hands of the left, Marine Le Pen defends herself from a suit for irresponsibility and downplays the impact of a motion of censure on the budget.
The boss of the RN has the means to bring down Michel Barnier's government in a few days, but it is a very delicate decision in a context of political instability and degraded public finances.
The day after her first formal meeting with Michel Barnier at Matignon, she took up her pen on Tuesday in Le Figaro to counter-attack against what she denounces as “false information” disseminated by the executive.
With the back of her hand, she rules out any risk of a “shutdown” in France, an American situation where federal civil servants are not paid and public services are blocked in the absence of agreement in Congress on a budget.
“Even in the event of censorship, taxes would be lifted, civil servants paid, pensions paid, and medical care reimbursed,” maintains Marine Le Pen, who reiterated to the head of government her “red lines” in the draft budget .
On track for the next presidential election, she must also preserve the image of seriousness that she wants to give to her party while showing her concern for the working classes.
In particular, she considers the increase in taxes on electricity and the compromise on pensions “inadmissible”, and calls for “clear” savings on immigration and the functioning of the State. Obviously, it thus establishes a balance of power with the government to obtain concessions and ultimately avoid a vote of censure.
Several personalities belonging to Michel Barnier's coalition have warned of the risk of a financial crisis that would be caused by a fall of the government without prior adoption of a budget. Government spokesperson Maud Bregeon said on Sunday that she feared “a Greek scenario”.
– Bluff or not?-
It is next week that the government could have to resort to article 49.3 for the first time and therefore expose itself to censorship.
Within the government, Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau was probably the most virulent by directly targeting Marine Le Pen during a speech Monday evening in front of nearly 500 activists from the LR federation in Paris.
In his speech, he took up an argument that is going round and round among the Republicans to defend Michel Barnier, from their political family: the risk of bringing down a government anchored on the right so that it is replaced by another from the left.
“Would the security of the French be better ensured if, let's take an example at random, (the rebellious MP) Louis Boyard was in my place, he who says that the police kill?” asked Bruno Retailleau.
“She is very sensitive to this argument on the left,” one of her supporters admits to AFP.
The attack by the Minister of the Interior did not go unanswered for long: Marine Le Pen rejected a “big-red-that-stains” argument on X, before once again seeking to play down the drama, dismissing the possibility that the left would come to power, because such a government would immediately be censored.
If 67% of RN voters say they are in favor of government censorship, according to the latest Ifop barometer for the Journal du Dimanche, it has not escaped the right that a third of them do not support it and that They would be unhappy if the fall of the government led to a period of instability.
An LR official recently divided RN support into three groups to AFP, the first formed by long-time voters, the second by those who express their fed up and a third made up of former voters of right who would take a dim view of censorship.
Some like this tenor from the PS believe that she is bluffing about censorship. “But sometimes when you bluff you end up getting carried away by your own bluff.”
Conversely, a right-wing MP now says he is convinced that Marine Le Pen is ready to “go all the way” after hearing her detail the measures she categorically rejects in the budget.
“When you go into so much detail, it’s because you’re looking for a pretext to strike,” he says, convinced that for RN voters, “the architects of the current chaos are not those who censor, but those which are in place.
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