The new Minister of the Interior, Bruno Retailleau, has attracted the wrath of part of the political class and shocked even the ranks of the presidential camp after having notably considered that “immigration is not an opportunity”.
Statements that provoke a reaction. Bruno Retailleau is criticized by part of the political class after asserting on Sunday on LCI that “immigration is not an opportunity” but also that the “rule of law is neither intangible nor sacred” in an interview granted earlier to Sunday newspaper (JDD).
Interviewed from his office, Place Beauvau, the minister expressed his “regret” that we cannot hold a referendum on immigration in France and estimated that “there will be no control of the immigration only if we have an overall plan.”
“What’s the difference with an RN Minister of the Interior?”
Pointing out “a thicket of legal rules”, he said he was ready to use “all the levers”, while saying he was “respectful” of Prime Minister Michel Barnier who must make his General policy statement Tuesday and “will announce a number of measures”.
Bruno Retailleau notably cited the possibility of extending the maximum duration of detention for people subject to an obligation to leave French territory (OQTF). “We can extend it by a lot, by doubling” to 180 days, he judged, but “that is not enough”.
He also cited the subject of expulsions, believing that “we must assume a balance of power” to send people back to their country of origin, citing “three levers”: the granting of visas, development aid and trade. Asked if he was in favor of double punishment, that is to say systematic expulsion after the sentence has been served, he also said he was “of course” in favor.
“What would be the difference with an RN Interior Minister?” asked the leader of PS deputies Boris Vallaud. The deputy of New Popular FrontBenjamin Lucas, for his part declared that “Bruno Retailleau is not France”, in reference to a post he made in December 2023 in which he wrote that “welcome is the France, fraternity, is France, immigration is France.”
“We did not form a Republican front on July 7 to hear the words that Jordan Bardella could have said if he had been prime minister,” wrote the socialist deputy Jérôme Guedj.
Thevenot judges that Retailleau “makes the bed for the RN”
The First Secretary of the Socialist Party, Olivier Faure, responded to the reservations expressed by the tenant of Place Beauvau concerning a “multicultural society”, likely according to him to shift towards a “multiracist society”.
“The Republic is secular and anti-racist. I wonder which of these three words, Republic, secular and anti-racist, Bruno Retailleau does not understand,” he declared on X.
These comments shock even the presidential camp. The former government spokesperson, Prisca Thevenot, estimated on X that we could “talk about immigration without denigrating the French people who come from it”.
“Our language makes it possible to differentiate between illegal and legal immigration. The first must be fought, the second must be controlled. Not making the distinction sets the stage for the RN,” she lambasted.
Faced with this, the national coordinator of La France Insoumise, Manuel Bompard, quipped: “One more little effort and Prisca Thevenot will vote for censorship!”
“Immediate drift towards populism”
The Minister of the Interior, criticized during his appointment – including by some of the Macronists – for his particularly conservative positions (support for the Manif pour tous, opposition to the constitutionalization of abortion, etc.) was already the subject of disapproval this weekend after comments made to the JDD this Saturday.
The former senator from Vendée returned to the columns of the far-right weekly on the murder of Philippine, a 19-year-old student at Paris-Dauphine University, found buried in the Bois de Boulogne, in western Paris . The fact that the suspect – a 22-year-old Moroccan already convicted of rape in 2021 – is under the charge of an OQTF had sparked strong reactions, in particular from the far right.
Bruno Retailleau adds another layer, denouncing a “point of imbalance where the rules end up protecting dangerous individuals more than the victims of society.” The boss of Place Beauvau goes so far as to call into question “the rule of law” which “is neither intangible nor sacred”.
“It is a set of rules, a hierarchy of norms, judicial control, a separation of powers. But the source of the rule of law is democracy, it is the sovereign people,” adds -he.
The interview, like that of LCI, provokes reactions on the left. “Democracy is both popular sovereignty and the rule of law, if only because being in the majority does not give the right to crush minorities,” replies Olivier Faure on X. While emphasizing that “the people sovereign” “did not give Retailleau the slightest mandate”, his party having arrived “last in the legislative elections”, or more precisely very far behind the left bloc, that of the presidential camp and that of the extreme right.
This outing also tenses the presidential camp. The President of the National Assembly, Yaël Braun-Pivet, said she was “quite worried” on France 2 this Monday morning. “The rule of law is what protects our fellow citizens. It is the principle of separation of powers between the executive, the legislature and the judiciary. It is the equality of all before the law. is the hierarchy of standards, that is to say that a minister cannot take all the measures he wishes”, she lists.
At Modem, whose deputies hesitated to support the new government, Erwan Balannant calls on Michel Barnier to “reframe” his Minister of the Interior and warns: “the sovereign people without the rule of law is the drift immediately towards populism and the dream of extremes.”
