It is a controversial text, largely censored by the Constitutional Council. The immigration law was promulgated from New Delhi (India), where Emmanuel Macron was traveling on Friday. The text was published in the Official Journal this Saturday, January 27 and the first application instructions have already been presented to the prefects.
Tighter access to social benefits, annual migration quotas, tightening of family reunification criteria… The Constitutional Council on Thursday rejected numerous measures adopted under pressure from the right, with the support of the far right. In total, 35 articles were totally or partially rewritten.
The Republicans denounced a “democratic hold-up” and “a legal coup d’état” by the Sages. This is a “very worrying” challenge to the institutions, reacted the president of the institution Laurent Fabius on France 5 Friday evening, highlighting a purely “legal” decision.
Possible Republican (LR) candidate for the 2027 presidential election, Laurent Wauquiez sounded the charge a few hours after the Sages’ decision. The president of the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region even proposed that Parliament could have “the last word”, after the Constitutional Council. “This is what a government wanted to do in Israel,” underlined Laurent Fabius in reference to an attempt at reform by Benjamin Netanyahu, invalidated by the Supreme Court. “The Constitution, etymologically, is what holds us together,” he insisted.
“Coup of the judges”
In the wake of Laurent Wauquiez, the president of the Republicans Eric Ciotti vilified “a democratic hold-up” and accused Laurent Fabius of “collusion” with Emmanuel Macron against the “will of the French people who want less immigration”.
The attacks from the right – and from the far right, Jordan Bardella (RN) speaking of a “coup d’état by judges” – were denounced by the rest of the political spectrum. “It is then difficult to claim to be a culture of government,” noted the former Minister of Industry Roland Lescure on X. “The Republicans are no longer republicans or even Gaullists,” denounced the socialist Olivier Faure. The only dissenting voice at LR, Xavier Bertrand, Laurent Wauquiez’s potential competitor for 2027, also said he was “in deep disagreement”. “When political leaders heat everyone up, you risk having an end of mandate that could resemble that of Donald Trump,” he warned.
Triumphant after the adoption of the law in December, the right and the far right are all the more furious that the Council censored only three articles on the merits and 32 others on the grounds that they had no place in the scope of this text. “How dare we pretend that there is no link between immigration and family reunification?”, indignant the boss of senators LR Bruno Retailleau. This case law regarding amendments rejected because they were judged to have no direct or indirect link with the initial text, “goes back several decades”, defended Laurent Fabius.
No bill represented
LR and RN hoped that the Council would cancel certain substantive measures in order to justify the need for a constitutional revision to modify migration policy. Nothing now prevents Parliament from voting again in due form on these controversial measures and “at that time, we will say what we think on the merits”, remarked Laurent Fabius. The President of the Senate Gérard Larcher also urged the government to “resubmit a text consistent with the agreement” between LR and the majority. But Gérald Darmanin took the lead, assuring that the executive “will not present a bill” on the subject.
For his part, LFI coordinator Manuel Bompard requested the withdrawal of the law, judging that “the text validated by the Constitutional Council corresponds to the text rejected by the Assembly” and therefore has “no legitimacy”. The final text retains the structure initially desired by the government, with a large component of simplification of procedures for expelling delinquent foreigners.