Deputy Éric Ciotti has been elected as the new president of Los Republicos. (LR related to PP in France). According to the results released this Sunday afternoon, 53.7% of Militants supported his candidacy in the runoff of a primary election where he faced Senator Bruno Retailleau (46.3%). 70% of its 91,000 militants took part in this internal vote demanded by the Republican right. correcting the course of a historic party marked by the right and its decline It received only 4.7% of the vote in the last presidential election and 10% in the legislative elections at the national level, but remains the entity with the largest municipal and regional power.
Ciotti, 57, who has been a member of the National Assembly since 2007, surprised her by getting the most votes in the first round of the LR primaries to choose her candidate for the presidential election in December 2021. Later, however, other plaintiffs and barons opened an anti-Ciotti front, as they saw him as Ciotti. very radical. This served to triumph over Valérie Pécresse, who would resoundingly fail in the Élysée race. A year later, Ciotti took his strange revenge in an internal process without surprises. He started as a favourite, and is already the top voter in the first round. This proved that LR’s rank and file and barons were no longer afraid to hand over the keys to an agent. hard wing of the party.
But his election doesn’t mean he’ll be the new leader of the field or a future candidate for the 2027 presidential election. In reality, the militants chose more of a political plumber and hoped he would too. draw a clear line and soothe many internal divisions. Ciotti himself, who does not stand out for his personal charisma, has already said that he has bet on Laurent Wauquiez, former minister of Nicolas Sarkozy and current president of the Lyon region, that he will be the future candidate for the Élysée.
As opposed to “politically correct”
Eric Pauget, spokesman for Ciotti’s campaign, tweeted: “Thanks to you, there is a ray of hope for France to continue to be France! Together we must unite the right.” LR’s new president, an “uncomplicated right” that opposes what is “politically correct”. “We should be proud to be right, we should be proud of our history,” at a rally at the party’s headquarters in Paris on Thursday. A few words in which he sums up his controversial strategy: redeeming the party’s identity by denying it.
Ciotti, what He was never a minister and for years was seen as a minor leader.justifies its historical militancy in the RPR, founded by Jacques Chirac in 1974, then in the UMP, and finally in Los Republicos, the new name given by former president Nicolas Sarkozy to the heir to the Gaullist right in 2014. The legacy of General De Gaulle in his ideological assumptions. Actually, promises not to betray his militantsSomething relevant in Le Pen’s far right or a party marked by defectors in President Emmanuel Macron’s space.
Closer to the far right
Since he set foot in the National Assembly, this leader has made an effort to call for the right to land that allows more prisons to be built, more irregular migrants deported, or French citizenship from birth to the end. These offers and harsh speeches against Islam and immigration They endeared him to the LR base, who tended to position themselves far to the right of the prototypical French conservative electorate. Its Republican right ancestry also benefited from its founding in the Alpes-Maritimes, a flirtatious, wealthy region with an aging population on the Côte d’Azur. This party has the delegation with the most militants.
Ciotti’s commitment to the far right was reflected in his recent presidential campaign, with one of his most controversial positions. “Between Macron and (candidate) extreme right) Zemmour, I prefer Zemmour. I have no problem saying that,” he declared over and over. Although electoral deals between the far right and LR seem unlikely in the short run—the French double-round electoral system makes them pretty redundant—Ciotti’s election in the general election is LR chairman, that party. envisages a clear opposition role for
Despite the electoral decline, the Republican right, with 62 deputies, acts as a hinge in the National Assembly, where Macron-affiliated formations do not have an absolute majority. There is also a majority in the Senate. In other words, LR has a significant weight in the administration of France. During the internal primaries, Ciotti said, “harsh but responsible opposition“This means that he is firmly opposed to a coalition government with Macronism, although he may support drastic measures such as future pension reform (right and left) a warning to the French president “if the country needs it”.