MACRON LETTER. The Head of State announces his presidential candidacy in a “letter to the French”, published at the beginning of the evening this Thursday on the sites of the regional daily press. Emmanuel Macron has chosen a form adapted to the circumstances, while the war affects Europe.
7:21 p.m. – In an hour, Emmanuel Macron will be officially a candidate
In an hour, around 8:30 p.m., a letter to the French will be broadcast by the information sites of the regional daily press. Written by Emmanuel Macron, it will address the people directly to signify the candidacy of the President of the Republic to his own succession.
7:12 p.m. – Emmanuel Macron, last of the candidates, first on the starting line?
At 8:30 p.m., the news sites of the regional daily press should unveil Emmanuel Macron’s letter to the French in which the head of state informs that he is a candidate for his own succession. He would therefore be the last candidate to present himself. More than 500 sponsorships already validated by the Constitutional Council, Emmanuel Macron is well ahead of the voting intentions. According to the latest Harris Interactive poll, he would be credited with 27% of voting intentions in the first round of the presidential election, well ahead of Marine Le Pen (18%).
18:58 – A declaration of candidacy at the last moment
Emmanuel Macron’s candidacy comes “at the last moment”. While we are 38 days away from the first round of the presidential election, the President of the Republic will therefore have waited until the day before the closing of sponsorships to announce his candidacy for his own succession. An imagined time before going to the agricultural fair Parc des expositions de la porte de Versailles in Paris, the head of state will have had to delay it a little more with the conflict in the east. Indeed, Emmanuel Macron placed himself as a negotiator to promote diplomatic exchanges from the start of the war in Ukraine.
6:44 p.m. – Emmanuel Macron reveals the content of his exchange with Vladimir Putin
On his Twitter account, Emmanuel Macron revealed the content of his exchange with President Putin that he had on the phone the same morning: “I spoke this morning with President Putin. Stop his attacks against Ukraine, to At this stage, he refuses it. Maintaining the dialogue to avoid human tragedies is absolutely necessary. I will continue my efforts and contacts. We must avoid the worst.”
I spoke this morning with President Putin. Cease its attacks on Ukraine, at this point it refuses. Maintaining the dialogue to avoid human tragedies is absolutely necessary. I will continue my efforts and contacts. We must avoid the worst.
—Emmanuel Macron (@EmmanuelMacron) March 3, 2022
18:17 – Tracks from his program
Since last September, Emmanuel Macron has hinted at what could be the main lines of his program. It will focus in particular on education and “the school of the future”, a school based on educational freedom left to schools. Emphasis will also be placed on security by doubling the presence of law enforcement on the territory. To do this, the President of the Republic intends to reorganize the police.
18:01 – Emmanuel Macron should also post a video
According to information from Figaro, Emmanuel Macron should post a video in addition to his letter to the French. According to the national daily, the President of the Republic would have chosen this double option rather than a declaration.
17:28 – An unpublished declaration of candidacy
This Thursday evening, Emmanuel Macron will officially be a candidate for his own succession. The format of the letter to the French is completely new. These predecessors had preferred to do so during a statement, an interview or by answering a question. Finally, the President of the Republic reuses the format he himself had favored when he announced the opening of the Great National Debate.
5:20 p.m. – This is not Emmanuel Macron’s first letter
Emmanuel Macron has already used writing to address the French and in another moment of tension in his five-year term: it was in 2019, in the midst of the yellow vests crisis. The Head of State was already taking up his pen at the time to announce the great national debate organized after this first major social crisis of the five-year term (the letter is still available on the website of the Elysee). “In a period of questions and uncertainties like the one we are going through, we must remember who we are”, wrote Emmanuel Macron in this letter, already promising “a new contract for the Nation”.
17:13 – Nicolas Sarkozy also sent a letter to the French in 2012
Nicolas Sarkozy also sent a letter to the French in 2012, before the first round of the presidential election, which he lost to François Hollande. The outgoing president then said he wanted to get his message across “as directly as possible, without any intermediary” and “do it in writing, because the written word remains, the written word engages”. Nicolas Sarkozy had quoted Charles de Gaulle at the end of his letter and considered that “if we were not the French people, we could shrink from the task. But we are the French people”. A voluntarism which should also tint the letter of Emmanuel Macron.
17:08 – The local press: a choice that is not trivial for Macron
The choice of the local press to publish his “letter to the French” is not a trivial choice on the part of Emmanuel Macron. “The local newspapers have imposed themselves because the French have great confidence in them”, assures the political journalist of BFMTV Philippe Corbé, who believes that “there is a very strong link of proximity between the regional press and many families. in France”.
5:00 p.m. – A letter to transform the candidacy announcement into a “non-event”?
The newspaper Le Monde published on his website an article stating that “Emmanuel Macron wanted to make his candidacy for the presidential election a non-event”. A strategy which also explains the use of the letter to the French. “Fearing that the formalization of the candidacy of the Head of State would lead to a mechanical drop in the polls, his followers had theorized the need not to make this announcement an event”, writes Alexandre Lemarié, political journalist for the daily which recalls what everyone around Emmanuel Macron has been hammering for weeks: he will remain “president until the end” and will not give way behind the candidate. He also recalls the meaning of the announcement scheduled for Thursday evening, quoting the Elysée: “We have always said that it had to be a mix between a solemn act and an announcement presented as obvious because an outgoing president who wants to be reappointed must play the continuity”.
4:50 p.m. – A letter from Macron, like Mitterrand?
The reference has been widely cited since the announcement of Emmanuel Macron’s candidacy letter: the outgoing president chose writing to address the French, as François Mitterrand had done in April 1988 to stand as a candidate too. to a second term. If he had already revealed his intentions on television, the socialist president had taken the trouble to write a 25-page letter in which he called for a “united France” (read on the website of the François Mitterrand Institute). “My dear compatriots, true political responsibility obliges us to take into account the problems of society as they arise and are transformed. It also obliges us to remind everyone that nothing is ever given, that a life is built in every moment, that the effort is the law”, wrote the predecessor of Emmanuel Macron in the first lines. Words which, once again, are reminiscent of the current situation.
16:36 – Where will Emmanuel Macron’s letter be published?
Emmanuel Macron’s application letter will be published on regional daily press sites. Among them, the Ouest-France group, La Voix du Nord, Le Progrès, The Latest News from Alsace, Le Dauphiné Libéré, La Dépêche du Midi, Midi Libre and L’Indépendant.
16:27 – A letter to the French from Macron who telescopes another
Deliberate maneuver or chance of the agenda: Emmanuel Macron unveils his “letter to the French” this Thursday, March 3, the day that Eric Zemmour also chose to address voters. The far-right candidate also unveiled a “letter to the French” printed in 3 million copies and sent by post, according to a journalist from BFMTV. It will also be distributed by activists.
My dear compatriots, in a few days, we will decide together our destiny and that of our children.
By this letter, which you will receive at home shortly, I invite you to the mobilization for France on April 10 and 24. pic.twitter.com/jkXnLJ3UZJ
— Eric Zemmour (@ZemmourEric) March 3, 2022
16:23 – A letter marked by a choice of society?
#contents Emmanuel Macron has outlined this several times in recent weeks: he could focus his campaign on a handful of fundamental subjects, even on a very clear choice of society between a progressive France, attached to freedom, confident in progress but also in the European project and a France according to him “withdrawn into itself”, marked by distrust vis-à-vis science and the elites and attracted nationalism or even a certain form of authoritarianism. In his speech on Ukraine on Wednesday, he announced a “change of era” in which “democracy is no longer considered an indisputable regime” and “is questioned”. He promised “an important democratic debate for the Nation” and assured that the situation “will not prevent us from meeting on the essentials”. Words that some already interpret as “a foreword to his letter to the French”.
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Emmanuel Macron, according to information from Figaro, has planned to upload a video on his social networks, to accompany the long letter of declaration. The Head of State is therefore doing the traditional thing, with a written address to the French, as François Mitterrand did in 1988, when he stood for a new term in the presidential election, and in the unpublished. Never has a sitting president opted for this form to make his intentions known. Emmanuel Macron has several times used social networks to communicate, in particular to give news of his health when he contracted the Covid-19.
After weeks of false suspense, Emmanuel Macron formalizes his candidacy for the presidential election, this Thursday, March 3, 2022, in a letter addressed to the French and published in the titles of the regional daily press. He said he “wants” to, but the head of state delayed announcing his decision for a long time. The President of the Republic had explained that he wanted to get out of the health crisis and settle the conflict between Ukraine and Russia. If the first point seems to be on the way to being resolved, the second, on the contrary, has worsened and the war has been started. But faced with the timetable imposed by the Constitutional Council, the tenant of the Elysée was forced to announce his decision in the midst of an international diplomatic and humanitarian crisis, the deadline having been set for Friday March 4 at 6 p.m. On the side of La République en Marche, everything has been in order of battle for several weeks to praise the merits of the leader, defend his record and convince the voters to support him for five more years at the Palace.