The end of the Le Pen era is becoming clearer at the RN. And it will be effective from November 5, the date on which a congress is convened, which will therefore designate a successor to Marine Le Pen. It will be played a priori between Jordan Bardella, interim president in recent months, and Louis Aliot, the mayor of Perpignan who has not officially applied.
As for Marine Le Pen, she is refocusing on her missions in the National Assembly, and on this unexpected contingent of 88 deputies who now sit alongside her. It must be said that the epicenter of political life having moved to the Palais Bourbon, it is hardly surprising that the former presidential candidate made this choice. During the previous mandate, and without a bloated group, the boss of the RN had already gradually moved away from Nanterre, where the party’s headquarters was located until last year. Many executives then deplored the physical distance that Marine Le Pen had established, the time spent in Paris … seeing it as a sign of disinterest in the RN as a political formation. That she hands over clarifies things.
Whether the next president is called Bardella or Aliot, ultimately, is a bit of a show. And that allows Marine Le Pen to debunk the idea of a party that would be a family SME. Even if both Jordan Bardella and Louis Aliot have maintained family ties with Marine Le Pen.
Still, there are slight differences in style between the two. The methodical Jordan Bardella, 26, facing the false nonchalant, Louis Aliot, 52, and of whom a little more than 30 passed to the FN, then to the RN. Without forgetting the differences in sensitivity too, between the first very focused on identity and security issues, the second, a lawyer by training, like Marine Le Pen, who speaks more readily of justice and the economy. But both will basically have little room for maneuver to print a new line since Marine Le Pen has warned: it is she – and she alone – who will continue to determine the line of the movement.
Is this, ultimately, a sham change? Let’s say that we will have to see how far Marine Le Pen gives leeway to his successor. Will she keep a formal role at the RN? She announced that she will continue to take care of the international. But will she sit on the executive board or the nominations committee? Because it is there that decisions are made which, from a distance, seem anecdotal, but which in fact say a lot about who really has the power in the party.
Will the next president of the National Rally have all the latitude to choose who sits in these bodies? It is to him that, in theory, the power of appointment falls. Or will Marine Le Pen prefer to keep a form of guardianship over the movement by imposing her relatives in all positions? Everything is decided the day after November 5. Will the next president of the RN be able to freely recruit his teams? Or will he be given names by Marine Le Pen? The party has been emptied since the legislative elections: the permanent members having either been elected deputies or having been recruited as parliamentary collaborators. It is on all of this that the real change will be judged. Not at rebranding or a change of name at the head of the party.