Friday began with an image of unity for the left around the New Popular Front, it ended in confusion and division. After four days of intense negotiations around a common program and the distribution of single candidates, the investitures (or not) of certain candidates created great tensions.
LFI: Quatennens retained, but not Corbière nor Garrido
Starting with La France Insoumise, a member of the New Popular Front with the most candidates to invest: 230 in total. Adrien Quatennens, outgoing deputy for the 1st constituency of the North, sentenced to four months suspended imprisonment for domestic violence, will be on the starting line.
On the other hand, Danielle Simonnet, elected in Paris, as well as Raquel Garrido and Alexis Corbières, deputies for Seine-Saint-Denis, who embody discordant voices within La France insoumise, were brutally dismissed and replaced by other candidates. “Jean-Luc Mélenchon has settled accounts with me and my friends,” reacted on Franceinfo this Saturday morning, Alexis Corbière. “An emancipatory political party does not work like a private company where the boss fires you because he can no longer supervise you,” thundered the man who has long been a traveling companion of Jean-Luc Mélenchon, criticizing this behavior. petty” and “small”. François Ruffin, reinvested in the 1st constituency of the Somme, reacted strongly to X, regretting “the division while the extreme is at the gates of power”. “I have not fallen under the caudine forks of your stupidity, your sectarianism. You prefer a man who hits his wife, author of domestic violence, to comrades who have the impudence to have a disagreement with the great leader. Our democracy deserves better than you.”
The boss of the Ecologists Marine Tondelier also said she was “extremely shocked” by the “purge” within LFI. “I called the EELV authorities this morning to see what action to take on this,” she declared on France 2 this Saturday. The boss of the Ecologists wants the New Popular Front to support, despite everything, the candidates ousted by LFI.
In addition, Manuel Bompard retains the 4th constituency of Marseille, where he was elected with more than 50% of the votes in 2022. The same goes for the rebellious Clémentine Autain, candidate for re-election in the 11th constituency of Seine-Saint-Denis, for Sophia Chikirou, Danièle Obono and Aymeric Caron in Paris. Rachel Keke, MP for Val-de-Marne since 2022 and leading figure in the strike of maids at the Ibis Batignolles hotel, loses her seat. The president of the NPA, Philippe Poutou, inherits a seat in Aude, under the LFI banner.
PS: Jérôme Guedj candidate without the New Popular Front label
Less divided, the Socialist Party must also reinvest, but above all invest in new candidates, having obtained more seats than in 2022 (175 against 70). According to information from our colleagues at The mountainconfirmed by AFP, the former President of the Republic François Hollande (PS), ex-mayor of Tulle, is a candidate in the first constituency of Corrèze.
Another heavyweight: according to information from L’Express, the former Minister of Health, Aurélien Rousseau, will be candidate of the New Popular Front for Public Square in Yvelines. In Paris, where the PS inherits four seats, Emmanuel Grégoire, current deputy to mayor Anne Hidalgo, was selected to face the former Renaissance minister, Clément Beaune.
In addition, the outgoing PS deputy for Essonne Jérôme Guedj, target of violent attacks by the rebels over the war in Gaza, announced that he was running again in his constituency but that he was refusing the banner of the New Popular Front. In a press release, the socialist, who intends more than ever to “beat the extreme right”, refuses, “apart from the beauty of words”, to “associate himself with the inauguration of LFI linked to this agreement”. And this, “because of the deep differences with the leadership of this formation relating to the brutalization of public debate”.
EELV: exit Julien Bayou
Among environmentalists, the case of Julien Bayou, former co-president of the group in the Assembly, excluded from the party because of a complaint for moral harassment and abuse of weakness by his ex-partner, raised questions. He declared himself a candidate for succession in Paris, without the support of the Ecologists. He finally withdrew his candidacy this Saturday morning in favor of the candidate of the Popular Front, still unknown.
The environmentalists have also invested a good part of their leavers, including the Lyonnaise Marie-Charlotte Garin and Sophie Taillé-Polian (Génération.s) in Val-de-Marne. New faces are also appearing despite a decrease in the number of seats for the party (92, compared to 100 in 2022). This is the case in the third constituency of Marseille, where Amine Kessaci, founder of the Conscience association and 10th on the European environmentalist list, will defend the colors of the New Popular Front.
The outgoing deputy for Val-d’Oise Aurélien Taché, elected in 2017 under the En Marche label, then moved to EELV to finally join the Insoumis group, announced his candidacy for re-election under the LFI banner.