On July 13, the future of America was probably at stake in Pennsylvania and by a few millimeters. The photo of Donald Trump, who survived the assassination attempt, with his fist raised and his bloodied ear went around the world at the speed of social networks. For a few hours, American news brought the French out of their interminable institutional nightmare. A pause that offers us not a moment of respite but a warning. That of an America gangrened for eight years by a dangerous populist cocktail based on verbal violence, questioning of institutions and fake news.
The last few months of the campaign have illustrated this perfectly. The former president has regularly treated his former opponent Joe Biden, with his legendary elegance, as a “pile of ruined shit” in front of his supporters, a “vermin” who “lies, steals and cheats in elections”. He will certainly redouble his creativity, once his new opponent is knighted by the Democratic Party. Enough to continue the story started at the end of 2020: that of the theft of the last election by the Democrats. An untruth that resulted in his supporters being drawn into a “march on the Capitol” and in which Donald Trump is still locked, calling this election a “fraud” during the last debate.
In France, since 2017, we have been tasting each of the ingredients of this explosive cocktail one by one. The yellow vest crisis was synonymous with a challenge to representative democracy and resulted, among other things, in the ransacking of the Arc de Triomphe in December 2018 and an attempted intrusion into a ministry the following month. The health crisis in 2020 saw the proliferation of untruths and conspiracy theories regarding the origin of the pandemic, the measures to limit its spread, and the vaccine – a huge success – that got rid of it. Since 2022, political violence has become omnipresent. A far-left MP now sees no problem in proudly setting foot on a balloon bearing the image of a minister. Far-right MPs choose to take pictures of themselves in front of a sign reading “Go make soup, bitch” intended for two female environmentalist MPs. Over the months, we have unfortunately become accustomed to these intolerable excesses. Once the shock has passed, we have integrated them so that in the end nothing shocks us anymore…
France victim of an American-style drift
And yet, since the beginning of 2024, while the situation in France simultaneously brings together all the ingredients that risk leading America to the worst, we continue to ignore the warning signs. The violence observed during legislative elections marked by 51 attacks has provoked only weak cries of indignation. On TV sets, we let the far left present itself as the winner of an election in which its representatives barely obtained 75 seats out of 577. Few are those who protest when a leader of La France insoumise proposes “a major march” towards Matignon, or when a union wants to “put the National Assembly under surveillance”. We let the populists describe the re-election of Yaël Braun-Pivet to the rostrum as a “coup de force”, a “democratic denial”. One can imagine the reaction of this far left if another coalition were to emerge to form a government…
The American drift cannot escape the gaze and understanding of the French: that of political violence pushed to the extreme. Violence as the only means of expression whose sole objective is to crush the words and acts of moderation coming from the parties of government. As in the United States since 2016, all the ingredients are now gathered in France. The next Prime Minister, because his legislative room for maneuver will be almost zero, will ultimately have only one mission and it is major: to propose to the French an awareness and a return to appeasement before it is too late.
Jean-François Copé, former minister, mayor (LR) of Meaux
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