Long in the ranks of the right, magistrate Jean-Paul Garraud has sat with the National Rally in the European Parliament since 2019. Who is he?
At 68, Jean-Paul Garraud was seeking his second term in the European Parliament under the banner of National Rally. The president of the French delegation of the Identity and Democracy (ID) group had little to fear in these European elections, since he appeared in 5th position on the RN list, announced as the big favorite. The magistrate, a former deputy of the RPR then the UMP, easily retained his seat. He was a real asset in the rise of Jordan Bardella’s party and Marine Le Penwhich he joined in 2019.
Member of the Horaces think tank, which has advised the RN for several years, Jean-Paul Garraud is one of the figures of high graduates who participated in the demonization of the party: a graduate of the prestigious national school of magistrates, he is a specialist in the issues justice and security. “We have a record which is clearly superior to those of the Macronist deputies so I would like us to move away from the caricature”, he defended at the microphone of France Bleu during the European campaign, citing the “19,000 amendments” and “more than 150 interventions in the hemicycle during plenary sessions” by MEPs from his group.
What is Jean-Paul Garraud’s political background?
Long in the ranks of the right, Jean-Paul Garraud founded La Droite populaire in 2010, running from the right wing of the UMP then LR, alongside Thierry Mariani. As early as the 2012 legislative elections, Garraud admitted to having “a certain number of shared beliefs with the FN” and raised “the question of maintaining a cordon santé around” the far-right party. In 2017, he supported the candidacy of François Fillon for the presidential election, before voting for Marine Le Pen in the second round. With La Droite populaire, he then began a rapprochement with the RN, until running for the 2019 European elections on the list of Jordan Bardella, then in 9th position, along with Thierry Mariani.
Jean-Paul Garraud definitively joined the RN in 2021, after being named head of the party list during the regional elections in Occitania, which he finished in second place. Member of the party’s executive office, Marine Le Pen even cited him in 2020 as a potential Minister of Justice if she won the Elysée.
Treaty of Lisbon, termination of pregnancy… The positions of Jean-Paul Garraud
In 2018, Jean-Paul Garraud expressed regret regarding his vote in favor of Treaty of Lisbon in 2008. He says he is in favor of leaving the European Court of Human Rights, which he accuses of propagating “a judicial policy very favorable to terrorists”. His work in the National Assembly focused a lot on the judicial sector and security: he was notably rapporteur for a law on criminal recidivism, or even on the ban on hiding the face in public spaces.
In 2003, he was the author of a very controversial amendment, finally withdrawn by the government, aimed at punishing with one year in prison and a fine of 15,000 euros an interruption of pregnancy caused by “clumsiness, recklessness, inattention, negligence or breach of a duty of safety.