It was the most anticipated political duel of this start to the presidential campaign. In open war for several weeks, Marine Le Pen and Eric Zemmour gave two big meetings, Saturday February 5, to try each to appear as the big winner of the current match on the far right. The two competitors are also given equally (14% each), according to an Ipsos / Sopra Steria survey for franceinfo and The Parisian.
During her “presidential convention” in Reims (Marne), the candidate of the National Rally, who had denounced at the beginning of the week “the Nazis” gravitating around Eric Zemmour, preferred this time to attack Emmanuel Macron.
The former polemicist was meanwhile in Lille (North), near the electoral stronghold of his direct opponent. But he did not once mention the name of Marine Le Pen, devoting most of his speech to purchasing power. A theme on which he had not previously campaigned.
Eric Zemmour wins the numbers war
With Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the two far-right candidates, Marine Le Pen and Eric Zemmour, neck and neck in the first round according to our latest poll, are those who gather the most supporters in their meetings. But in this game of numbers, it was Eric Zemmour who won this Saturday. After his big meeting in Villepinte (Seine-Saint-Denis), which brought together around 12,000 people in December, the former editorialist brought together 6,000 to 8,000 people this time in Lille.
He is therefore numerically ahead of Marine Le Pen, who brought together around 4,000 people at the Reims Exhibition Center. In this room, smaller than the Grand Palais in Lille, the head of the RN, who was holding her first major meeting in this presidential campaign, reviewed the scenic device of her meeting. In particular, it mobilized around sixty coaches from all over France.
Reims and Lille, places of symbolic meetings
If Eric Zemmour chose to hold a meeting in Lille, it is primarily because Hauts-de-France is one of the electoral strongholds of the National Rally. The deputy of Pas-de-Calais and former municipal councilor of Hénin-Beaumont remains very popular in the region, while Eric Zemmour seems to convince more French people in the south of the country. It is also in Cannes (Alpes-Maritimes), that he organized an important rally on January 22.
Two hours by car from the city of PS mayor Martine Aubry, Marine Le Pen had chosen Reims, whose cathedral hosted the baptism of Clovis and the coronation of most of the kings of France. A reference that speaks to part of his sovereignist electorate, but also to that of Eric Zemmour.
The battle for support is not settled
“Philippe, Gilbert, Guillaume, Jérôme, Jean-Frédéric…” At the start of his meeting, Eric Zemmour greeted all of his political supporters and in particular the elected officials who decided to join him. From Guillaume Peltier (from the Republicans) to former members of the National Rally like Gilbert Collard and Jérôme Rivière, the candidate of the political movement Reconquête! wanted to highlight his political rallies to show the weakening of Marine Le Pen’s party, but without ever mentioning the latter.
The RN candidate tried to stop the bleeding by denouncing, at the start of the week in Le Figaro, “traditionalist Catholics, pagans and some Nazis” which gravitate in the Zemmour galaxy. But she also had to note the absence in Reims of Senator Jérôme Ravier and MEP Nicolas Bay, officially positive for Covid-19, but suspected of wanting to join Eric Zemmour. Marine Le Pen, on the other hand, was able to count on official endorsements from Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and Italian League leader and former Prime Minister Matteo Salvini, whose supporting videos were released ahead of his speech.
Purchasing power for Eric Zemmour, an anti-Macron speech for Marine Le Pen
Contrary to his usual speeches, Eric Zemmour did not remain confined to the themes of immigration and insecurity, but ventured on the issue of purchasing power. During his one-and-a-half-hour speech, he said the word “work” 72 times and the words “purchasing power” 35 times.
The former polemicist notably promised to be “the president who will end the waste of taxpayers’ money”, by drastically reducing taxes and social contributions. He therefore proposed the creation of a “zero charge premium”, which would allow an employer to pay up to three additional months’ salary each year to an employee, without paying social security contributions on the bonus paid.
For her part, Marine Le Pen did not react at all to Eric Zemmour’s speech and the latter’s recent attacks. On the other hand, she sharply tackled the policy of Emmanuel Macron, whose name she pronounced 21 times. For more than twenty minutes, the RN candidate denounced “mistakes, vanity and cynicism” of the outgoing president, calling him “contemptuous” and “depressing”. The ill-fated 2017 presidential runner-up also lambasted “Emmanuel Macron’s progressivism which does not mean progress but deconstruction, not progress but regression”.
Much more surprisingly, Marine Le Pen decided at the very end of her speech to leave her desk to confide in her personal story. “As a child, I experienced political violence”, she launched, advanced on the scene, evoking the bomb attack which targeted the family home in 1976. After recalling her status as a mother “single parent”, the RN candidate sought reassurance about her ability to win the presidential election: “I learned a lot, I fumbled, I sometimes failed, I fell, but I always got up. (…) So at a time when I stand before you for the supreme function, I am ready !“