They who thought they had exceeded this stage. Wednesday morning, in Strasbourg, we are agitated in the European Parliament. The parliamentarians of different parties hold a meeting concerning the Franco-Algerian writer Boualem Sansal. In discussion: a transpartisan resolution filed by MEPs to request his release. The negotiations were well underway, the agreements almost concluded between the different parties. Foot change. The left and the center refuse to join the far right. The national rally, and the PFE group (Patriots for Europe) in which it sits, are therefore invited to withdraw. Still missed.
The national rally may preside over the third largest group in the European Parliament, having won the June 2024 elections by having 30 of its representatives elected (out of 81 MEPs), its pariah status sticks to the skin. In Brussels as in Strasbourg, the Lepéniste party has not obtained, apart from the group’s presidency of Jordan Bardella, no key position. No vice-presidency, chairmanship of commission, or other places of quaestor. For many new elected officials, who hoped to make this siege an outpost of dedication, it is disillusionment. “We must learn to use this position in the conditions given to us, but we are completely set aside, deplores an RN parliamentarian. It deprives us of a power of initiative, and even a short power, we has a lot of trouble. “
Unsuccessful attempts
Some are trying, despite everything, to show white leg. July 2023. The room empties, in Brussels, after the first meeting of the “Human Rights” subcommittee. Mathieu Valet, MEP RN, approaches Mounir Satouri, his environmental counterpart, who has just been elected president of the subcommittee, and tries an approach. “Thank you very much for respecting my political current … You know, I too am the son of immigrants.” The interested party remains perplexed. Another decor, same process. After speaking in a meeting, the elected macronist Bernard Guetta feels slight pressure on his shoulder. Behind him, Malika Sorel, elected frontist (number 2 on the list of Jordan Bardella in June) slips a small paper: “Bravo M. Guetta!” The examples are legion. “We have the impression that they are trying by all means to obtain recognition, to bypass a political ostracism by human resources,” comments an elected centrist. But seven months after the election, nothing helps. The RN remains persona non grata.
However, in the European Parliament, political balances were upset by the last elections. The instance is now leaning very largely on the right and the extreme right, today, are represented by three groups. Patriots for Europe (PFE, where the national rally sits), Europe of sovereign nations (ENS, where Sarah Knafo sits, Reconquer member), and European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR, where Marion Maréchal and the representatives of his party), or 187 seats in total, including 35 French. The ECR group, however, is not struck by the same ostracism, and regularly participates in coalitions with the representatives of these currents. “So the Zemmourists are considered to be respectable, while we are the reincarnation of the devil,” chokes a frontist.
Favorite activity of the extreme right: shoot yourself in the legs
The context, however, allows lepenists, zemmperists and other marshals to indulge in their favorite activity: to shoot themselves in the legs. In Brussels as in Strasbourg, we therefore go to dismantle the credibility of his rivals (however sometimes allies, do not seek to understand). Latest example: December 12 in the European Parliament, the majority of group presidents discard the idea of a debate on the free trade agreement between the EU and the Mercosur. During a preliminary meeting, the ECR group in which Marion Maréchal sits on, had spoken for the holding of such a debate. Whatever, in the process, the RN publishes a visual. We see Marion Maréchal there alongside Raphaël Glucksmann, Valérie Hayer and François-Xavier Bellamy. Like them, she is accused, and the ECR group with her, to refuse the holding of a debate. “Our Italian and Polish allies were outraged to be attacked publicly by the RN on such a sensitive subject,” said Ident-Libertés (Marion Maréchal’s party). The publication will be deleted.
Largely represented in the European Parliament, the French far right is no more united than on the national territory. But the balance of power has changed here in favor of the right, offering it new perspectives. Alliance possibilities, in particular, with the PPE group, where representatives of the French right sit including François-Xavier Bellamy. Sentenced to the previous mandate to establish alliances with the left and the center, the PPE now has the possibility of an alternative majority, if it adds its voices to that of the extreme right. Thus, in October, this coalition voted a text aimed at recognizing the opponent Edmundo Gonzalez Urrutia as the “legitimate president, democratically elected, of Venezuela”. In November, the Alliance managed to postpone European deforestation. If the position of the RN does not allow it to exist as such, it can now serve as a extra force for the European right which has no more reluctance to make lepenists their detailed allies. “There are two alternative majorities, for the PPE is the ideal position, assures François-Xavier Bellamy. In the last mandate it is Renew who was in this situation, there we have a coalition either with Renew either with the others Right groups, there is no majority without us, and if the left -wing groups do not want to collaborate, we only have to turn to our right. “
RN, now Pivot Force
A new configuration, which, without making the RN a decision -making force, devotes it as a pivot group. But the PFE group is far from constituting a united and indivisible force. Between the elected officials of the party of Jordan Bardella and their allies, there are many differences, sometimes capital. On economic, societal or foreign policy, it is common that frontists are not aligned with the positions of the Hungarians of Fidesz de Viktor Orban. “The PFE group is more an addition of delegations than a group with real ideological coherence,” assumes a member. The Hungarians are in particular favorable to the signing of an agreement between the European Union and Mercosur, while the RN opposes it vigorously. The very conservative positions of the Hungarian MEPs, in particular on the rights of women, are so far from the image that Lepénist elected officials wish to return to the National Assembly in particular.
On international issues, while Jordan Bardella strives to erase the Prorussian tropism that sticks to the skin of his party, the multiple positions of Viktor Orban in favor of Vladimir Putin sometimes push him to temper this line. He thus condemned the first resolution of the new Parliament, reaffirming the support of the EU to Ukraine in the form in particular of standardized financial aid, and denounced the journey of Viktor Orban to Moscow, after going to kyiv , while Hungary presided over the EU council.
Hungarian domination
Some frontists assure it: despite the group presidency attributed to Jordan Bardella, it is the Hungarian who lead the dance. “They decide everything, and we execute,” confesses, disappointed, a frontist framework. According to participants, the conferences of group presidents are largely abandoned by the party leader, leaving the hand to the first vice-president of the PFE group, the Hungarian Kinga Gal. “It is sure that he works less than the other MEPs, concedes an elected RN, but hey, he must also manage the party, and that does not bother the operation of the group.”
The transfer of Jordan Bardella to the Foreign Affairs Committee was, according to his relatives, “to give him a scope”. “We do not see it often, and when it is present, it does not mark the meetings by its positions”, persifishes a MEP Renew. Summarizing the state of mind of the Frontist delegation to the Assembly is still their allies who do it best: “RN’s strategy in Brussels is to enjoy the maximum of money while minimizing the catch risk. ” The analysis is signed identity-library. When you have friends like that …