During her greetings to the press, on Thursday January 16 in the afternoon in Nanterre (Hauts-de-Seine), Marine Le Pen announced her candidacy for the presidential election of 2022.
After having failed in the 2012 elections, because she ended in third place, and 2017, facing Emmanuel Macron, she confirmed her intention to enter the race for the top position once more, reported French daily Le Figaro. “My decision has been considered, but it is taken,” said the president of the National Rally.
Le Pen highlighted the growing social divisions the country: “My project is to go towards a project of national unity, around a great French design, a great unifying project which can bring together the French wherever they come from, a project of great alternation to get the country back on its feet,” she told reporters.
She added: “The deep reasons for this decision to be a candidate, you understand, is that there is no doubt about my desire for victory”. Marine Le Pen may not have been officially designated by her party to run for the 2022 election, but time is running out.
Therefore, there is no question of letting the current president take the lead. “Emmanuel Macron has launched the presidential campaign himself, I will not let him run alone,” she said. “I’m preparing for the presidential election while taking into account that this is a decision which should be taken by the Congress” of the party.
Her announcement has had the effect of speeding up the electoral calendar, just two months from the municipal elections. According to a member of the candidate’s immediate entourage, contacted by BFMTV , the timing was “perfect”.
“She is prepared, then presents herself to the movement with a presidential project that activists are invited to validate and amend before the real campaign starts. It seems healthy and democratic to me,” he said.
Asked about this unusually early campaign launch, he seemed confident about the chances of Marine Le Pen to enter into the second round. “It’s obvious, the national/global duel (Macron against Marine) has started. The question is that of the project. One year to develop it, one year to present it,” he explained.
According to an Ifop poll published in mid-November, the rating of the president of the National Gathering is at a record level , with 36 percent of “good opinions” recorded, especially among supporters of the Republicans.
In this regard, for example, in Lunel, (Hérault), seven “LR or assimilated” joined the Marine Le Pen camp for the municipal elections .
Last Sunday, the former boss of the Republicans of Hérault, Sébastien Pacull now supported by the RN in Sète called “all [his] friends of the Republicans” to join him at a convention given in Paris by the party.
It was obviously heard, since the local LR official of Lunel (Hérault) Clément Serna, as well as “six LR or assimilated” , chose to leave their party to join the municipal list of the elected RN, reported Le Monde. “I will not fight a speech almost identical to ours!” he said.
In the same forum as Sébastien Pacull, Marine Le Pen also called on “LR voters to open their eyes” .
“Your ideas are defended here today,” confirmed Thierry Mariani, also a defector of the Republicans.
Indeed, the stated goal of Marine Le Pen’s party is now to take the political place that the classic right-wing in France occupied. This strategy seems to work, since the RN and certain LRs share common values on the subjects of security, immigration or the fight against “ethno-culturalism” – a term used to designate the fight against Islam.
The main obstacle between the RN and LR is due to economic issues. Sébastien Pacull also believes that Marine Le Pen does not have “the same analysis” as he does on the subject of pensions, for example.
For many LRs, it is therefore an alliance of circumstance only. Clément Serna goes even further, declaring that he will never vote RN. For him, the municipal elections are the occasion to “regroup to win, but one is not doomed to vote for the same candidates in the national elections”. He is also ready to believe in a union of the right-wing … but with Marion Maréchal, not her aunt.