Ironically, Emmanuel Macron’s last two right-wing candidates, Michel Barnier and Rachida Dati, have a rather complicated past…
By appointing Michel Barnier as Prime Minister on September 5, 2024, Emmanuel Macron wanted to pull off a new, unexpected political coup, which he has the secret to. He is also bringing into Matignon a very old figure of the right, who is certainly consensual, but who has a history with a good number of political figures. A history that could play tricks on him when it comes to choosing his future ministers. This former tenor of the right, chief Brexit negotiator for the European Union, will indeed have to take care of his casting, he who is responsible for forming a government in a perilous parliamentary context, where the threat of a motion of censure looms.
The appointment of Michel Barnier to Matignon will revive many memories. Among them, that of an electoral campaign 15 years ago, where Michel Barnier found himself forced to team up with another figure of the right, also recently rallied to Emmanuel Macron: a certain Rachida Dati. In 2009, under pressure from Nicolas Sarkozy, the Minister of Justice had to reluctantly agree to appear in second position on the UMP list led by Michel Barnier for the European elections in Île-de-France.
An alliance imposed by the Élysée that did not delight the two interested parties. Rachida Dati, a rising star of Sarkozyism, did not want to leave the government after only two years at Place Vendôme. As for Michel Barnier, a long-standing MEP, he had to deal with this newcomer parachuted in at his side.
Barnier, Dati: a complicated campaign
The motley tandem wanted to be a symbol of the diversity desired by Nicolas Sarkozy: he the experienced, serious and sometimes slightly pale elected official from the Alps, she the young minister with an explosive temperament, of North African origin and having grown up in a city in Burgundy. Their association was also part of a political calculation by the Élysée to boost a UMP list threatened by competition from the MoDem and the left at the time. Finally and above all, it was necessary to oust a Minister of Justice who was accumulating criticism from the judicial world, castigating her “method”, her authoritarianism at the Chancellery and her reforms carried out at a brisk pace…
During the campaign, Rachida Dati will be subjected to a trial of nonchalance after statements where she did not seem really concerned by the EU and its adventures. As for Michel Barnier, he will struggle to exist in the face of the media coverage of his running mate. Their image will remain permanently blurred, the European adventure will turn into a way of the cross.
Can Rachida Dati be kept in government by Michel Barnier?
However, on the evening of June 7, 2009, the Barnier-Dati list will win by a wide margin in Île-de-France, with 29% of the vote. Elected as an MEP, Rachida Dati will finally feel authorized to savor her victory and put a toe (just one) in the European deep end, even if she will leave the government with regret. Michel Barnier will return to Brussels, crowned with this success, continuing his journey as an EU convict.
Fifteen years later, Rachida Dati, who made her last splash in January by being appointed Minister of Culture by Emmanuel Macron, could well find Michel Barnier on her path. Ironically, it will be up to Michel Barnier to decide the future of his former running mate in the government. Because the Élysée has been able to suggest in recent weeks that Rachida Dati, who resigned since the majority’s defeat in the legislative elections, could be reappointed. A hypothesis that strangely recalls the pressure once exerted by Nicolas Sarkozy to pair them on a European list.