Finding 577 candidates in just under two weeks is not easy. At the National Rally, we had to cast a wide net. The “Matignon plan” may well have been ready, as all the executives of the far-right party assured the day after the dissolution, the simple reserves of the party were not sufficient. To invest in its candidates and substitutes, the RN has mobilized and recycled the entire ecosystem that has revolved around it for years, including part of its small group side. A picture ranging from the traditional right to the radical far right, which would constitute a very heterogeneous group the day after the legislative elections of July 8. Overview.
RNJ and collaborators
We had to draw on young people, first. Fortunately for the frontists, the National Youth Rally (RNJ) led by the MEP and close to Jordan Bardella, Pierre-Romain Thionnet, offers a significant pool of candidates and already trained in activism. Often parliamentary collaborators, these new faces landed a promotion before their time. Emergency requires. Among them, Céline Sayah, former assistant to RN MEP Annika Bruna, and departmental delegate of the RNJ in the North, invested in the 7th constituency of the North. Sébastien Chenu’s collaborator, Alexandre Dufosset, invested in the 18th constituency of the North. We also include Julien Limongi, collaborator of Julien Rancoule, who inherits the 4th constituency of Seine-et-Marne, or Matthias Renault, collaborator of the RN group in the Assembly, candidate in the 3rd constituency of the Somme.
Student unions
As for the student unions, it has been years since we stopped bothering with the idea of a cordon santé. The UNI, a traditional right-wing union, indicated very early on that it was in favor of an alliance with the far-right party. Nothing surprising when we know the porosity that has existed for years between the different youth teams. Last year, Pierre-Romain Thionnet, Stanislas Rigault (president of young people with Zemmour) and Guilhem Carayon (leader of young LR, invested as part of the alliance between the right and the RN) shared the front page of the magazine far right The Incorrect, ensuring that their ideological disagreements were only anecdotal. The UNI was therefore happy to provide some of its executives to swell the ranks of candidates. Among them, Estelle Chevallier, active within the right-wing union and invested by the RN in the 2nd constituency of Vienne, Grégoire Granger, former member of the UNI, candidate in the 6th constituency of Loire, Quentin Taïeb, member of the UNI and LR and “union” candidate in the 5th constituency of Haute-Savoie, or Hanane Mansouri, member of the UNI and former LR executive, also invested under the dual label LR-RN in the 8th constituency of Isère. Charles Prats, vice-president of the UNI and media magistrate, regularly cited by the RN for his expertise in social fraud, will run in the 6th constituency of Haute-Savoie.
La Cocarde also, a small identity union, with neo-rightist influence (notably the defense of ethno-differentialism in the name of the right of civilizations to remain themselves), which has gotten into the habit of providing collaborators and executives at the National Rally, got his hands dirty. Thomas Brisseau, former head of the Cockade in Angers, is invested in the 2nd constituency of Maine-et-Loire. Pierre Gentillet, one of the founders of the union, close friend of Jordan Bardella, known for his regular interventions on CNews, is a candidate in the 3rd constituency of Cher. A lawyer by training, he was at the head of the young people of the Popular Right (the movement of Thierry Mariani within the UMP), and founded the pro-Russian Pushkin circle, where Jordan Bardella visited, in 2017 in particular.
CNews networks
Pierre Gentillet is not the only CNews speaker to present himself under the Frontist label. Guillaume Bigot, columnist on Vincent Bolloré’s channel, will also be a candidate in the 2nd constituency of the Territoire de Belfort.
Small groups and substitutes
As is often the case, at the National Rally, there is the window and the back room. And in this matter, the party with the flame always has difficulty detaching itself from its group roots. Among the substitutes for candidates in the legislative elections, we find several controversial profiles, such as that of Julie Apricena, RN departmental delegate for Cher and deputy for Pierre Gentillet in Cher, she is also a former activist of the Bloc identitaire, who sported for example, in 2015, a t-shirt with the Celtic cross (emblem of the GUD) bearing the “White pride” logo.
In the 2nd constituency of Paris, Melody De Witte, the Frontist candidate, is replaced by Rodolphe Cart, a well-known activist in identity circles, author of a work on Georges Sorel published in the New Bookstore (well known to identitarians) and contributors to the New Right magazine Elements. He also participated, in January, in a debate at Academia Christiana, the fundamentalist and identity association that Gérald Darmanin announced he wanted to dissolve last December. This Monday, in addition to several sulphurous profiles directly invested by the far-right party, Release spotted, as a substitute for Pierre Brochet in the 11th constituency of French people living abroad, a certain Eric Miné, former activist of Fane, a small neo-Nazi group from the 1970s and of the neofascist movement Oeuvre française.
The Marion Maréchal networks
For those latecomers, Marion Maréchal’s relatives are back at the National Gathering. After a divorce between Marine Le Pen’s niece and Eric Zemmour’s relatives, the MEP managed to negotiate a few places, under the RN label, for several of her relatives in the context of the upcoming elections. Thibaut Monnier, head of his Lyon training school (Issep), is a candidate in the 4th constituency of Drôme, Agnès Marion, press officer during Marion Maréchal’s European campaign, is parachuted into the 9th constituency of Val -d’Oise, Eddy Casterman, in the 3rd constituency of Aisne, Patrick Louis in the 9th constituency of Rhône, and Anne Sicard in the first constituency of Val-d’Oise. Another close friend of Marion Maréchal, Gérault Verny, entrepreneur involved in Eric Zemmour’s campaign in 2022 and investor in identity media Black Book (recently renamed Borders) is also invested, under the dual label LR-RN, in the 14th constituency of Bouches-du-Rhône.
Internal recycling
In several constituencies, the RN also recycled its MEPs just elected during the June 9 election. Among them: Gaëtan Dussausaye, in the 2nd constituency of Vosges, Anne-Sophie Frigout, elected in 2022 but whose election had been invalidated, returns to the 2nd constituency of Marne, Virginie Joron, MEP repeatedly criticized for her anti-vax positions , is a candidate in the 2nd constituency of Bas-Rhin, Marie Dauchy, another MEP, in the 3rd constituency of Savoie, like Julie Rechagneux, recently pinned by Streetpress for his connections with neo-Nazi circles, invested in the 4th constituency of Bordeaux. Pollster Jérôme Sainte-Marie, in charge of the Héméra campus (the National Rally executive school launched in October 2023 and whose record is very meager), will also be a candidate, for the first time, in the first constituency of Hautes- Alps. Finally, sister of Marine Le Pen and companion of her advisor MEP Philippe Olivier, Marie-Caroline Le Pen will be a candidate in the 4th constituency of Sarthe.
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