On Wednesday, December 5 late in the morning, at the National Assembly, Marine Le Pen answered questions from a journalist on the details.
Jacques de Guillebon is indeed director of the monthly L’Incorrect, but also member of the scientific council of Issep, the school launched by Marion Maréchal in Lyon.
The long interview was featured in the publication devoted to the movement of Yellow Vests on Saturday, December 15. It has been a much-discussed event in the conservative milieu in France, because since the creation of L’Incorrect by several relatives of Marion Maréchal, in September 2017, Marine Le Pen had stubbornly refused to grant any interviews to the magazine.
The main reason for her refusal was the presence of a co-founder of the magazine, known as Arnaud Stephan, a pseudonym. He was a former parliamentary colleague of Marion Maréchal. However, Marine Le Pen and Arnaud Stephan are old enemies.
In his role as advisor to the then deputy of Vaucluse, Marion, Stephan readily inflamed the dissension between Marion Maréchal and the leadership of the Front National.
The party became increasingly uncomfortable with the singularity cultivated by the young politician.
Arnaud Stephan left publication in November, after a quarrel with Jacques de Guillebon, in a “political” break, he told French weekly L’Obs.
Stephan is no longer happy with the content of L’incorrect he maintains. He saw it as an instrument to “build bridges” between “all right-wingers”. But beyond that, there were also other incompatibilities that drove the two men to stop collaborating.
“They separated for really personal reasons: it did not work between them”, a friend of Marion Maréchal who knows the two men well, told conservative publication Marianne. “It’s impossible to work with him” says Jacques de Guillebon about his former co-worker.
After Stephan’s departure Jacques de Guillebon immediately got the green light from Marine Le Pen for an interview.
Le Pen does not support the notion of a “union of the conservatives”, contrary to her niece. In the forthcoming interview, she insists instead on the importance of French social issues and believes that the Yellow Vest crisis should heighten the debate on immigration and identity.
It thus appears that the debate between the “Marinists” and “Marionists” will continue.