Édouard Philippe did not wait for the start of the official campaign for the legislative elections, Monday, May 30. The former Prime Minister has supported “his” candidates for several days by criss-crossing France. They are also easy to spot: an entire page is dedicated to them on the site of Horizons, the party of the mayor of Le Havre. For the former tenant of Matignon, the pace is steady: one day, one trip. He holds a meeting Tuesday in Angoulême and Wednesday in Val-d’Oise.
As during the campaign for the presidential election, he intends to demonstrate that if he is loyal to Emmanuel Macron, he is no less free. A cliché has also annoyed a lot in Macronie: that ofEdouard Philippe in Reims, alongside Aina Kuric, deputy of the outgoing majority but not invested by En Marche and its allies. She presents herself as a dissenter. Thursday, Aina Kuric thus relayed on social networks a photo of her alongside Édouard Philippe. Those close to the latter speak, not without malice, of “chance encounter”.
At the same time, Horizons, the party of the former Prime Minister, let it be known that the dissident candidates who will be elected will be integrated into the group in the Assembly. “There’s no reason not to”explains a spokesperson, “since these elected officials will have been legitimized by the French”. The idea is to have a group that weighs in the National Assembly and why not a “hinge group”, begins to dream of someone close to Édouard Philippe. They are a few to make this prognosis at Horizons: Emmanuel Macron will not, alone, have the majority of 289 seats at the Bourbon Palace. “The political factbet a candidate, is that the government will be forced to rely on the two other formations that are the Modem and Horizons” for the texts to be adopted.
Edouard Philippe makes the same calculation as the Modem of François Bayrou: he wants to have this group which brings the decisive voices to each vote. A Phillipist framework goes further: “If Macron has the 289 seats on his own, there will be a disintegration of his group during his term of office because everyone will be thinking about the aftermath.” This means 2027, when Emmanuel Macron can no longer be a candidate. Horizons hopes that the deputies who will defect will join the ranks of the Edouard Philippe team.