On the sidelines of the presentation of the National Rally program, Jordan Bardella asked that Jean-Luc Mélenchon “come and debate” Tuesday on TF1, facing him and Gabriel Attal, as representative of the New Popular Front, instead of Manuel Bompard, the coordinator of France Insoumise. A wish already formulated a few hours earlier by Gabriel Attal, at the microphone of Europe 1. The president of the RN estimated that “part [de la gauche] search [ait] to hide Jean-Luc Mélenchon when he is, by his own admission, a candidate for the post of Prime Minister.”
Since the start of the campaign, Marine Le Pen’s party and the presidential majority have taken responsibility for individualizing these anticipated legislative elections, and continue to designate the former presidential candidate as the first minister chosen by the New Popular Front. A name thrown around like a foil, even if this question has not yet been resolved by the components of the left bloc. “They seem not to agree on a name, or at least pretend not to agree, and yet the result is a foregone conclusion. They said it themselves, the largest group in the Nupes [sic] will choose the Prime Minister. The one with the most candidates and leavers: it’s Nupes,” argued Gabriel Attal during a press conference last Thursday.
A little game indirectly fueled by Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who openly ran for the position of head of government – in the event that the left won an absolute majority on July 7 –, while pretending not to want to impose himself faced with the outcry in the ranks of the left. “I don’t eliminate myself and I don’t impose myself. I think it’s a formula that is quite respectful of the collective,” he explained on the set of the show C l’hebdo on France 5, this Saturday. But also to declare in the same broadcast: “I intend to govern this country”.
“There, Jean-Luc Mélenchon is becoming a burden”
The insoumis will once again be the guest of France 2, this Monday evening in the wake of 8 p.m. A media presence which allows him to show that he remains essential on the left of the political spectrum, even though he no longer holds any elective mandate, nor any official function within his own political party.
But these different interventions also annoy his partners: “We are completely zen! », quips ironically, at the mention of the upcoming interview, a communist parliamentarian before bursting out laughing. “If speech is silver, it would be time for the LFI to remind their leader that silence is gold”, tackles a socialist strategist. “We have already shot ourselves in the foot several times unnecessarily with certain investitures… There, Jean-Luc Mélenchon is becoming a burden, I can confirm it to you,” says Patrick Kanner, the president of the PS group in the Senate, still very critical of the merger with LFI.
“The Popular Front belongs to all those who refuse to abandon France to the extreme right. No one can proclaim themselves Prime Minister. The NFP deputies, in conjunction with their parties, will choose the personality who creates consensus to bring the country together,” wrote Olivier Faure, the First Secretary of the PS, in a post on the social network X.
“He will not be Prime Minister”
Except that here too, the method has not yet been precisely decided. To all lords, all honor: on the side of the rebels, it was first estimated that the party arriving first on the left, on July 7, would have free rein to choose the future tenant of the Matignon hotel. Olivier Faure, for his part, was more in favor of a vote by all left-wing deputies. A vote that several heavyweights of the senatorial left, such as Patrick Kanner and Rachid Temal, would like to extend to the elected representatives of the Palais du Luxembourg. “I remind you that nothing obliges the Prime Minister to come from the deputies. Since we are talking about Parliament as a whole, we could include the senators,” explains the former Minister of Sports under François Hollande.
But whatever the method chosen, on the side of the most minority parties within the alliance, we are already burying the candidacy of Jean-Luc Mélenchon. “He is not the leader of the New Popular Front and he will not be Prime Minister,” Marine Tondelier, the national secretary of the environmentalists, told AFP on Monday. “There is an agreement to say that the Prime Minister will have to be found by consensus among the different political forces,” affirmed the boss of the ecologists after a meeting with the other party leaders, including Manuel Bompard.
Communist senator Ian Brossat agrees: “The hypothesis that he becomes Prime Minister is not serious. He can be a candidate, but he will not be elected. It will be no for the communists and socialists! “, he assures. “And even if LFI remains the majority group and proposes its candidacy, the other partners will have their say. »
“If we had demanded that the choice of Prime Minister be decided in advance… there would have been no agreement”
On the sidelines of the legislative campaign, a battle for influence has also opened on the left of the political spectrum. The PS, which came very well ahead of LFI in the European elections, thanks to its alliance with Raphaël Glucksmann, the co-founder of Place Public, hopes to regain momentum against the rebels, in a position of strength since 2022. Before dissolution, the Socialists only had 31 deputies compared to 75 for the rebels. The electoral agreement signed two weeks ago grants 230 constituencies to LFI and 175 to the rose party.
“We have the impression that Jean-Luc Mélenchon is doing everything to ensure that the ‘social traitors’, as he calls them, do not become the center of the left,” continues Patrick Kanner. “As soon as he speaks in the media, we are referred to him. Today, this beautiful alliance is weighed down by someone who is not even running for the legislative elections. This borders on sabotage! », exasperates the elected official from the North.
The social democrats do not spare their attacks against the tribune: “Let him shut up,” said François Hollande this weekend, speaking to France Inter. “I know, if there is a union, it is so that all political groups can participate. But there, when there is so much rejection, when there is even more rejection of Jean-Luc Mélenchon than of Le Pen or Bardella, there is a moment when we must be aware of what the general interest is. », Supported the former head of state, who went back to campaign in Corrèze. “What do we want to do?” Do we want to win the left or create conflict? I refuse confrontation because that is what the extreme right wants. Everyone has to make an effort. I made the effort,” he recalled.
“He must be silent, and finally understand that he is not capable of being a point of balance,” insists Rachid Temal. While insisting on “the importance of the program, of the overall philosophy”, several left-wing elected officials interviewed by Public Senate admit that the question of incarnation risks holding them during the campaign like Captain Haddock’s sticking plaster. “If we had not demanded that the choice of Prime Minister be decided in advance… there would have been no agreement,” admits a socialist.
“Wanting to do without LFI and Jean-Luc Mélenchon is not wanting to win”
By seeking to remain at the center of the game, Jean-Luc Mélenchon wants to keep control of his political party. He also anticipates the next move and tacitly positions himself for 2027: “He has a relationship with his party that is no longer the same,” explains Rachid Temal. A reference to what some have called a purge; the ousting of outgoing LFI deputies who have, in recent months, openly criticized the tribune’s positions. At the same time, other personalities, no less critical of Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s line, are regularly cited for taking the initiative on the radical left, such as François Ruffin or Clémentine Autain.
“Wanting to do without LFI and Jean-Luc Mélenchon is not wanting to win,” believes Paul Vannier, outgoing LFI deputy, and one of the negotiators of the agreement which gave birth to the New Popular Front. This former professor of history and geography believes that the rejection shown towards Jean-Luc Mélenchon is rather “a form of political debate, specific to the Parisian microcosm”, and that it is not representative of the feedback ground. “I consider it an asset to mobilize in the neighborhoods, among first-time voters, the most popular classes but also in the Overseas Territories,” lists this person very close to the rebellious leader. “In the street, people talk to me about him as a person they want to support,” assures the man who is running for re-election in the 5th constituency of Val-d’Oise, an area where LFI came well ahead. in the last elections.
But a little further south, in the Val-de-Marne department, the outgoing MP Sophie Taillé-Polian, a former socialist who moved to Génération. s, draws a much more nuanced observation. “There is a sense of responsibility in him recognizing that, if he is a problem, he will not seek to be prime minister. On the ground, I can only see that there is no consensus about his personality,” she explains to Public Senate.
An Odoxa survey for Le Figaro on June 20 supports this sentiment. 72% of French people surveyed have a bad opinion of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, including 57% a “very bad” opinion. Only 20% have a good opinion of him, a drop of 21 points compared to May 2022, when Nupes was still campaigning behind the slogan “Mélenchon: Prime Minister”. “If Jordan Bardella enjoys majority popularity among all right-wing sympathizers, Jean-Luc Mélenchon deeply divides the left,” observes Erwan Lestrohan, consulting director of Odoxa. Among left-wing supporters, 73% favor him as head of government at LFI, but this support literally collapses within the other groups: 22% among environmentalists, and only 19% among PS supporters.
