PRESIDENT LR. The members of the Republicans are called upon to elect their new president, on December 10 and 11, 2022. If Eric Ciotti is the favorite against Bruno Retailleau, the outcome of this second round nevertheless remains uncertain.
[Mis à jour le 9 décembre 2022 à 16h08] Who will be the new boss of the Republicans? The 91,109 members of the party are called upon to elect their new president during a second round between Eric Ciotti and Bruno Retailleau. The online ballot will take place from Saturday December 10 at 6 p.m. to Sunday December 11 at 6 p.m., and the results will be announced immediately after. If Eric Ciotti, who won 42.73% of the votes at the end of the first round, is the favorite against his rival Bruno Retailleau, who only won 34.45% of the votes, nothing is decided for this second round of voting.
The postponement of the votes of the voters of Aurélien Pradié, unsuccessful candidate in the first round (22.29%), could indeed tip the election in one direction or the other. The deputy for Lot did not give any voting instructions for this second round. In a letter addressed to the two finalists, Friday, December 9, he nevertheless considered that the future boss of the Republicans “should not combine his functions with the presidency of a parliamentary group”, according to information reported by Point. A message which seems to be addressed to Bruno Retailleau, president of the group Les Républicains (LR) in the Senate, since Eric Ciotti only sits in the National Assembly as a deputy for the Alpes-Maritimes.
Behind this confrontation between Eric Ciotti and Bruno Retailleau is another major duel: that of the regional presidents Laurent Wauquiez (Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes) and Xavier Bertrand (Hauts-de-France). The two politicians indeed have presidential ambitions, as reported The Parisian. During his campaign, Eric Ciotti indicated that he would nominate Laurent Wauquiez as a candidate for the presidential election of 2027 if he were elected president of the Republicans.
It is therefore no surprise that the president of the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region was present Thursday, December 8, alongside Rachida Dati, during a public meeting organized in Paris for the candidacy of Eric Ciotti. Xavier Bertrand, for his part, indicated to Marianne that he was going to support Bruno Retailleau for the second round, after the announcement of the results of the first. During a public meeting organized Thursday in Marseille by Bruno Retailleau, the deputy Bernard Deflesselles, close to Xavier Bertrand, was thus present, reports West France. The President of the Senate and member of the Republicans, Gérard Larcher, is also a supporter of the Vendée senator.
What are the results of the first round of the LR election?
None of the three candidates managed to obtain a majority of the votes during the vote organized on 3 and 4 December. Eric Ciotti and Bruno Retailleau will thus compete for the presidency of the party. Members will be asked to decide between them during a vote, again electronic, which will be held from Saturday December 10 at 6 p.m. to Sunday December 11 at 6 p.m.
72.67% of the 91,109 registered voters voted during this first round, i.e. 66,216 votes. Eric Ciotti obtained 28,297 votes, or 42.73% of the vote. Bruno Retailleau obtained 22,815 votes, or 34.45% of the votes. Considered since the beginning of the campaign as an outsider in the race for the presidency of the Republicans, Aurélien Pradié, unsurprisingly, finished last by collecting 14,765 votes, or 22.29% of the votes cast. These figures were revealed by Annie Genevard, current interim president of the Republicans, in the minutes following the end of the electronic ballot.
Potential candidates for the election had until November 3, 2022 to file the required sponsorships with the High Authority. After a campaign that lasted a month, the first round of the congress was therefore held between Saturday December 3, 2022 at 6 p.m. and Sunday December 4, 2022 at 6 p.m. None of the candidates managed to obtain the majority of the votes, and Eric Ciotti and Bruno Retailleau will therefore face each other in a second round, which will take place from Saturday December 10 at 6 p.m., and will end on Sunday December 11 at 6 p.m..
During the campaign preceding the first round of the election of the new president of the Republicans, Bruno Retailleau, Eric Ciotti and Aurélien Pradié all three spoke out against an alliance with the presidential majority. A common position which seems to be out of step with the wishes of LR supporters, according to the political barometer Odoxa-Mascaret produced for LCP, Public Senate and The Dispatch, and published at the end of November. Indeed, 73% of LR supporters questioned in this poll say they are in favor of Les Républicains joining an alliance, and 45% of them are in favor of an alliance with the presidential majority.
A position of LR sympathizers which seems to have been heard by Bruno Retailleau. The Vendée senator indeed indicated in an interview with Parisian on December 5, the day after the results of the first round, that he would organise, if elected, a referendum within the party before the end of the year on the question: “Yes or no, do you want an alliance with Emmanuel Macron? Bruno Retailleau nevertheless specified that he had never voted for the President of the Republic, and had never “considered any alliance”.
In any case, what is at stake in this election for the presidency of the Republicans seems of little importance for a large part of the French people, according to a Cluster17 poll carried out for Point and published Saturday, December 3. In fact, in this study, 72% of those questioned believe that Les Républicains have no political future. It should be noted that no polling institute has carried out a poll on voting intentions, given the actual number of voters, which is too low to constitute a sufficiently robust sample to produce reliable results.
As during the primary organized to designate the party’s candidate for the presidential election, only up-to-date members can take part in the vote to elect the future president of the Republicans. The election regulations indicate that only people who have paid their dues 30 days before the ballot, i.e. November 3, 2022, can participate in this congress. Thus, 91,109 people are called upon to vote for the second round, which will take place on Saturday 10 and Sunday 11 December. In 2019, when Christian Jacob was elected, 131,514 people were registered, but only 62,401 voted. In 2017, when Laurent Wauquiez won, 234,556 voters were eligible to vote and 98,543 participated.
Who are the candidates for the presidency of LR?
Bruno Retailleau, from the president of the LR group in the Senate to the presidency of the party?
The senator who leads the group of Republicans in the upper house of Parliament, Bruno Retailleau, sees himself taking the reins of the party of the traditional right. It’s September 2, in the columns of Figarothat the heavyweight of the party announced to be a candidate for the LR presidency, a choice which he explains by the absence of Laurent Wauquiez: “Yes, I will be a candidate for the presidency of the Republicans. Laurent Wauquiez had all the qualities to preside our movement but, in its absence, many have asked me to introduce myself. I am not lacking in responsibility, but I am not a man to shirk.”
Eric Ciotti, one of the first candidates for the presidency of the LR party
The deputy of the Alpes-Maritimes, already a candidate for the LR primary in December 2021 with a view to the presidential election, is trying his luck again by claiming this time for the presidency of the party. The man, figure of the right-wing wing of the right-wing formation, has been ensuring since the summer that he is “very determined” to take part in the reconstruction of the party, as he confided to the JDD on July 24… before confirming his candidacy two days later in Nice morning. In July, the parliamentarian said he had already started “work to offer both a large gathering and a modernized political offer, in line with the expectations of the French”. “To straighten out our country, he added in the Nice daily, there is only one way: that of reform”. With this new congress, he intends more than ever to count in the future of a party which he has never left despite external appeals (in particular those of Eric Zemmour).
The resignation of Christian Jacob made some waves. Former minister, former mayor of Provins and ex-president of the UMP group then LR in the Assembly (from 2010 to 2019), he took the lead of the party in October 2019. Known for his ability to federate, he had brought the party together in view of the 2022 electoral period. However, the formation, weakened by the results of the elections, is today crossed by quite diverse political and ideological lines, threatening its unity. Few subjects there are unanimous, starting with the legacy left by Christian Jacob. The world quoted as such the admiration of Aurélien Pradié for his former president “Chiraquian”, who knew how to transmit his experience to the new guard. But the media also quoted MEP Brice Hortefeux, who is more nuanced about the former boss, referring to his lack of incarnation of the function and his “non-presidential” side.
In addition, this departure from rue Vaugirard took place when the President of the Republic was in the midst of negotiations with the leaders of the opposition party. The LR group in fact occupies a role of choice within this new Assembly without a majority, torn between two oppositions that could not be more divergent (namely the Nupes and the RN). With some 70 deputies, the Republican right could be the adequate ally of a presidential camp in difficulty since the loss of the absolute majority on June 19th. The choice of its leader will therefore be crucial in the future of French political life and will determine part of the balance of power within the hemicycle.
The party is reorganizing itself as a whole. The election of Olivier Marleix at the head of the parliamentary group on June 22 marked a turning point, shortly after the departure of Damien Abad, conquered by the macronie. And the changes don’t stop there. Cécile Richez, until then the party’s communications director, has been replaced by Marie-Eve Malouines, Annie Genevard’s current communications officer. For her part, Cécile Richez became the party’s general manager in September.