By announcing a new immigration law for 2025, is the government trying to light “a counter-fire”?

Less than a year after the previous text, partly censored by the Constitutional Council, the government is working on a new immigration law… and is taking the risk of blowing on still red embers.

Talk about immigration when you have to pass an unpopular budget? “It’s not impossible that it’s a backfire“, smiles a government advisor. Maud Bregeon, government spokesperson, announced on Sunday October 13 a “new law” on immigration at the start of 2025, the 33rd since 1980. This announcement comes a year after the promulgation of the previous immigration law in January 2024 which ignited Parliament.

The objective of this new text is to “facilitate the extension of detention of foreigners in an irregular situation who present dangerous profiles in administrative detention centers“, explained Maud Bregeon on Sunday on BFMTV. Bruno Retailleau thus wishes to go from 90 days maximum to 210 days maximum.

Behind the scenes, while we thought that the political news of the week was the start of the budgetary debate which provides for some 60 billion euros in savings, scheduled for Wednesday October 16 in committee at the Assembly, the government is therefore moving on another subject. With this text on immigration, less than a year after the previous text, partly censored by the Constitutional Council, the government therefore takes the risk of blowing on still red embers, not without ulterior motives.

Because, at a time when the National Rally does not rule out censorship, “the threat is real, it’s a way to escape it“, assures a leading government advisor, for whom, with such a promise of firmness, “the RN will not be able to take the risk of sending Olivier Faure or Jérôme Guedj to Matignon“.

The other side of the coin: seeing the Macronists rear up. Historically, immigration is a very painful subject for the former presidential majority: “The most on edge, like Sacha Houlié, have already left the coalition. a little hand reassures. “Everyone wants to mark their territory“, puts into perspective the support of the new Minister of the Interior, seeing it rather as a godsend for Bruno Retailleau – “faithful to his convictions“, slips a senator – on the verge of establishing himself as the leader of the government.

But then, what will this new text look like? On the Place Beauvau side, we also assure that the measures rejected by the Constitutional Council will serve as a “base“. It is a cocktail of measures, voted at the end of 2023, by what was not yet the alliance of Macronists and Republicans, but ultimately censored by the Wise Men. On the table, we find in particular the creation of an offense of illegal residence, pushed by the senatorial right and its leader at the time, a certain… Bruno Retailleau.

Also under study: the old sea serpent of the transformation of state medical aid into emergency medical aid, the suppression of the Valls circular and its some 30,000 regularizations per year on precise work and family life, or even the extension of detention in detention centers to a maximum of 90 days today – up to 210 in the government’s idea. “Matignon is convinced that Barnier’s future depends on results on security and immigration“, concludes an advisor. Less than a year ago, after the vote, the RN had claimed a “ideological victory“.