By agitating the censorship of Michel Barnier, Marine Le Pen takes the risk of empty threats

POLITICS – The little music rises like the cold wave reaches France. What if, finally, Marine Le Pen censored the government, and at the same time overthrew Michel Barnier, at the end of a budgetary sequence ending, inevitably, with recourse to 49-3? In recent days, the hypothesis has continued to gain intensity, to the point that several ministers are stepping up to try to dissuade the Lepenist camp.

With one main argument: the maneuver would cause political and economic disorder from which the country would find it difficult to recover. “ How could the French understand that oppositions which share almost nothing would nevertheless vote together on a motion of censure, effectively putting France without a budget and without a government on Christmas Eve? », alerts the Minister of the Economy, Antoine Armand, in The Parisian.

« The time I have ahead of me depends on a possible coalition of opposites, if I may say so, in the National Assembly. I don't know if this will happen. I'm ready for it. I know that this is not what the French want, who today want stability, serenityé,” declared Michel Barnier before the 106th Congress of Mayors.

Image issue

In reality, the scenario is not cataclysmic, as explained to Liberation MP LIOT Charles de Courson, recalling that a government in charge of current affairs will be able to make budgetary decisions via ordinances. Nevertheless, the image issue is real for the Lepenist party, keen to appear as a constructive force, allergic to “ country blockade “, to better distance itself from a New Popular Front in which France Insoumise sits, a formation accused of ” to mess up » the country.

The fact remains that in fact, the RN obtained nothing from its nickname “ put under surveillance » of the Barnier government, if not in the vocabulary of Bruno Retailleau. A bit of a meager loot when we remember that the Minister of the Interior has long spoken like the extreme right and that it is to Laurent Wauquiez that the executive has left the task of presenting itself as the savior of retirees in margin of budgetary discussions. Which, backed by a budget that promises to be particularly unpopular, stirs up a feeling of revenge in the RN.

To an editorialist from Figaro who opposes this scenario, in the name of the opposition between “ the preferable and the hateful » in this turbulent period, Marine Le Pen responded sharply this Thursday, November 21 on the social network The “detestable” thing is to make retirees, the working working classes and middle classes pay for the madness of the last seven years (never censored by the LR right)! The “detestable” thing is to take 6 billion more on electricity and to continue to spend “crazy money” on the processing of immigration, to support the Migration Pact which settles migrants in our countryside under penalty of fines! Yes, that’s hateful! “, replied the president of the RN group, also keen to make people talk about her other than through her legal setbacks.

“We laugh about it among ourselves”

But will she go all the way? This Monday, Michel Barnier will begin a cycle of meetings with the parliamentary forces in Matignon, starting with the Socialist Party followed by the National Rally. The opportunity for the Prime Minister to listen to the budgetary grievances of the oppositions, before making final arbitrations, without the person concerned having much room for maneuver with regard to the state of public finances and red lines set by its partners of the “ common base “. Within the executive, where we have become accustomed to living under a sword of Damocles, perplexity dominates.

« It's bad timing, I think it would come too early for them. At the same time, they have gone so far in the threat that I don't see how they can justify going backwards. In any case, we laugh about it among ourselves, that doesn't stop us from moving forward on our files », philosopher with the HuffPost a ministerial advisor, who does not see what potential gain the RN could display to legitimize a change of position after having hit so hard to drive the point home. Unless all this agitation is ultimately just a bluff. “ I am one of those who think that censorship is like nuclear weapons for Putin », bets on Public Senate the experienced Macronist senator François Patriat, who judges that the bosses of the RN only seek to “ be considered » by the head of government. Nothing more.

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Except that within the National Rally, some really have ants in their legs. “ I am in favor of censorship, and as quickly as possible », entrusts to HuffPost a Lepenist deputy, claiming to have only good reasons to sanction the executive in the event of a 49-3 vote on the budget. “ I will not let this government increase the automobile penalty and create an automobile penalty on used cars », he warns, eager to fight. “The point is to block a fifty-first bankruptcy budget and a good-for-nothing government that follows the same political line as Borne and Attal,” sinks into The World Jean-Philippe Tanguy, RN deputy for the Somme and close to Marine Le Pen.

Here lies the other risk to which the Lepenist troops will be exposed in the event of renunciation: that of appearing as objective supporters of the government, even without participation. The left bloc, which already accuses the RN of having torpedoed an amendment to repeal the pension reform and which has promised censorship to Michel Barnier, will be happy to remind him. In addition to these possible accusations, describing Marine Le Pen as the “ crutch » from the government, the far-right formation runs another danger, of a strategic nature this time, by changing its footing. While Jordan Bardella proclaimed that “ nothing can be done without the RN », demonstration will have been made that this is not the case. And that the famous “ put under surveillance » of the Barnier government which the RN prided itself on was in reality done through the viewfinder of a cap gun. Plop.

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