Implosion of the French right, the president of the Republicans supports the RN

President of the French right-wing Les Républicains (LR), Éric Ciotti, announced Tuesday (11 June) that he will join forces with the Rassemblement National (RN), for the legislative elections, however, colleagues in the Gaullist party now calling for his resignation.

Ciotti announced on national television TFI that he had accepted the offer made by Jordan Bardella, Marine Le Pen, and the Rassemblement National (RN) for Les Républicains to ally for the snap legislative elections on 30 June and 7 July.

“I have taken on my responsibilities at a very heavy and serious time […] The country expects action from the right. We need an alliance,” he declared.

“By responding to this call for unity, Éric Ciotti is choosing the interests of the French over those of our parties,” Jordan Bardella congratulated him on social media X.

But Ciotti’s announcement was swiftly condemned by several members of Les Républicains, who disagreed with him.

RN has refused an alliance with the second far-right party Reconquête!, therefore a large right-wing coalition is far from guaranteed.

After French President Emmanuel Macron dissolved the National Assembly on Sunday (9 June), following Rassemblement National’s landslide victory (31.5%) in the European elections, their leader Marine Le Pen quickly proposed that her opponents rally behind her to form a majority in French parliament.

To save the right

With the possibility of the far-right sweeping into power and taking control of the National Assembly, Ciotti justified his call of an alliance with FN, to “maintain a powerful group in the National Assembly.”

Currently there are 61 LR members in the lower parliament chamber, but the party’s lead candidate François-Xavier Bellamy, had a poor showing in European elections (7.2% of the vote) further confirming the party’s fall.

According to negotiations between Ciotti and the RN, LR candidates who opt for an alliance with the far-right will be unopposed in the constituencies where they run.

The two parties would agree on a kind of common programme, which Marine Le Pen called a ‘charter’.

The dislocation of the Republicans

Ciotti’s announcement sparked a heavy backlash from within his own camp.

Gérard Larcher, president of the French senate and second-in-command of the French State, said on X that Ciotti “can no longer preside over [our] movement and must recover from his mandate as president.”

Olivier Marleix, president of the Les Républicains group in the French National Assembly, echoed this view, explaining that “Eric Ciotti’s comments are his own”, and asking him to “step down as president of the LR”.

Laurent Wauquiez, the LR president of the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region, announced on Tuesday his candidacy for the legislative elections in Haute-Loire, where the RN came out well ahead on Sunday. He denounced the “betrayal” of his former ally and the need to create “a pole of stability”.

In a joint statement, the Republican senators asserted their “independence” from both Renaissance and the RN. Quick to react, Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire called for “making room in [the] majority for all LR elected representatives and activists who refuse to collaborate.”

For now Ciotti is president of a party in ruins,  despite his explanation that “what counts are the militants.” It remains to be seen who Republican supporters are going to vote for.

[Edited by Laurent Geslin/Aurélie Pugnet/Rajnish Singh]

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