LR. The Les Républicains party knows its result this Sunday, June 12 in the 1st round of the 2022 legislative elections. The right-wing party is clearly outpaced according to the first projections.
Look for a legislative result near you
[Mis à jour le 13 juin 2022 à 00h17] The score of the Republicans in the 1st round of the legislative elections is becoming more refined. The party led by Christian Jacob and its ally the UDI recorded 11.4% of the vote according to several estimates, far from the RN at 18.8% and the leading duo, the NUPES in the lead with 26.2% and Together with 25 .9%. For several weeks, polls had predicted a painful defeat in many constituencies for LR, the first opposition party in 2017 after the previous legislative elections.
But why this drop? If the candidates have above all bet on a program of the traditional and republican right, many of them have not put forward the party on their leaflets. In addition, the LR logo is not present on it. To campaign, these candidates have above all bet on their local anchorage, mocking the parachutists macronists and Nupes. Enough not to become a secondary political party like the Socialist Party in 2017? The next few hours promise to be painful at the head of the party.
Despite the situation, and after the presidential berezina, Les Républicains officially refused, before this first round, any alliance, mentioned by certain elected officials, with Together, the coalition led by Emmanuel Macron. Pierre-Henri Dumont, secretary general of the LR, repeated it at the microphone of France Inter, Friday, June 10: “It is out of the question that we govern with Emmanuel Macron.” Rather, he is betting on a large enough number of deputies to be able to count during the next five-year term: “What is certain is that we will have to have a maximum of deputies to defend our proposals in the National Assembly.” The Republican leader thus intends to put pressure on the President of the Republic and his probable majority in the Assembly: “Either they take our amendments, our bills, and in this case we can vote on certain things with them to ensure the safety and health of the French, or it is not the case, and we will vote against the texts.” Will it be different after these results?
Absent from power for ten years, defeated in the last national election, the right-wing party had saved the furniture in previous local elections. 1st party of the Regional (37.63%) and the Departmental (65 presidencies of departments won) in 2021, it had all the same experienced a decline in the big cities during the Municipal elections of 2020. These legislative elections 2022 therefore have the appearance of a turning point with a new debacle expected at the end of a first round where the party did not reach 15% in the first round, a score which would only offer it 40 to 60 seats according to the first projections.
How to campaign after the national disaster and the absence of a strong figure capable of embodying the party line and giving a saving impetus? In the constituencies, the candidates for their re-election only seem to want to bet on their action as parliamentarians for five years and to campaign in their own name, even if it means not mentioning the party. Far from the NUPES, LREM, RN or even Reconquest posters! on which Jean-Luc Mélenchon, Emmanuel Macron, Marine Le Pen and Eric Zemmour are proudly exhibited in large format (sometimes even at the expense of the candidate), on the LR side, sobriety is in order: it is the candidate who takes precedence, if sometimes displaying alongside a prominent constituency mayor supporting him.
It is a quiet, sluggish campaign for Republicans in the midst of turmoil, who cherish despite everything the hope of keeping some of their bastions thanks to the local notoriety of their candidates. The party also wants to convince itself that, on the strength of its results in the municipal elections (despite the loss of large cities) of 2020, regional and departmental (election from which it emerged victorious) of 2021, its local anchorage will be a lifesaver. Christian Jacob, president of LR, assured the Point that “when it comes to entrusting the keys to the management of a community, voters prefer to turn to people they feel close to, personalities they can trust and who benefit from a certain experience This is why I have confidence in our result in the legislative elections.” Unless the Pécresse fiasco almost definitively bury the party, in a political landscape where it no longer seems to have its place between the extremes, both left and right, and Macronist liberalism.
The objective is simple: to influence national policy and impose the voice of LR against the presidential majority. In their legislative programthe Republicans put forward five priorities – purchasing power, security, health, freedom and quality of life – and a new credo: “spend less for less tax” a response to the famous “work more to earn more” that Emmanuel Macron has made his own.
For each theme deemed to be a priority, the party proposes a series of measures which it opposes to the balance sheet of the Head of State after his first five-year term. Regarding purchasing power, the main concern of voters at a time when inflation is increasing visibly, LR suggests applying measures on the price of fuels by lowering the amount of taxes but also on the tax exemption of overtime and the reduction of social contributions to increase wages, among others. Proposals already seen during the presidential campaign such as the “revaluation of pensions according to inflation” or the “abolition of inheritance tax for 95% of French people”.
In terms of health and the environment, the proposals also echo the presidential program. LR promises to put an end to medical deserts thanks to the assignment of 4,000 young doctors to municipalities in need of health professionals and to straighten out the hospital by recruiting 25,000 caregivers. To preserve the environment, the right is choosing nuclear power mixed with hydrogen and biofuels to reduce CO² emissions in addition to the implementation of a carbon tax at European borders.
The right cannot remove security from its priorities and suggests the establishment of “exemplary minimum sentences for zero impunity and [la création de] 20,000 additional prison places to apply 100% of the sentences”. Here the proposals are numerous but among the priorities LR wishes to “defend secularism and fight against Islamism by expelling foreigners registered in the terrorist radicalization file and by closing all the radicalized places of worship” and “suspend allowances for delinquents or parents of juvenile delinquents”. Other measures relate more particularly to immigration which the right intends to limit with “quotas by country and by profession” and the deprivation of visa for “countries which do not take back their illegal or delinquent nationals”.