Rejected by the National Assembly, Gérald Darmanin’s immigration bill will be studied by a joint committee following a decision by the Minister of the Interior and the Head of State. There is a great risk of seeing the text become tougher.
A clear defeat and all the more difficult to digest because the government had not foreseen it. The immigration bill carried by Minister Gérald Darmanin was rejected even before the start of debates in the National Assembly, on Monday December 11. The right and the left, opposed to the text for diametrically different reasons – the first camp finding the text too lax and the second too firm – supported the environmentalist rejection motion. A failure which does not, however, dissuade the government from defending its immigration bill. “I regret that we are wasting time to protect the French. These measures are necessary and I want them to be adopted quickly. […] Whatever path we take, I want firm measures” reaffirmed the Minister of the Interior, traveling in Val-de-Marne, the day after the snub.
From Monday evening, a few hours after the rejection of the immigration bill, and again this Tuesday, December 12, the government met to find a solution and organize a new examination of the text. Of the two solutions that were on the table – sending the text back for second reading to the Senate or convening a joint joint committee – the head of state opted for the second to “seek a compromise” on the bill “as quickly as possible “, as government spokesperson Olivier Véran indicated at the end of the Council of Ministers on December 12.
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Tougher measures imposed by the right?
If the majority intends to take its revenge on the Assembly and on the “majority of refusals” by giving its immigration bill another chance, it is the right that could emerge victorious from this joint joint committee. This commission composed of seven senators and seven deputies must be representative of the forces present in Parliament, and logically leans to the right. During the negotiations, LR parliamentarians should therefore succeed in imposing certain modifications as they did during the examination of the text in the Senate. A version of the immigration bill as tough or almost as that adopted by the upper house of Parliament could see the light of day. And if the right takes advantage of the failure of the majority and its position of strength – the LR votes being essential to have the text adopted in the Assembly – the text resulting from the commission could perhaps be even harsher than the Senate version.
But a toughened text which would be adopted by the joint committee would necessarily have to come back before the National Assembly. The presidential majority could then count on the votes of the Republicans, but lose those of its left wing, opposed to a text that is too firm. Some of the Renaissance deputies seem ready to vote for a harsher text, in particular those from the right wing like the elected representative of Hauts-de-Seine Maud Bregeon and possibly the most centrists. Will these votes coupled with those of the LR be sufficient to compensate for those of the deputies from the left wing of the majority? If the latter abstain – a vote against the bill by members of the majority would certainly be frowned upon – the vote should be guaranteed. But doubt is still slightly allowed. Regarding the text toughened by the Senate, left-wing MP Stella Dupont judged that it “trampled” on the values of the majority. Words that deeply irritated Gérald Darmanin.