The head of state will not speak on Friday, on the occasion of the national holiday. Since his first election in 2017, he has only twice complied with this meeting with the French.
This year again, the French will have to be content to see Emmanuel Macron in the presidential gallery, accompanied by the Indian Prime Minister, Narendra Modi, between two military processions, Friday July 14. After several days of uncertainty, the Head of State finally gave up on the ritual of the televised presidential interview during the national holiday. The President of the Republic was however eagerly awaited after the recent events which shook the country. He had also promised in mid-April to make a “first review” of its “one hundred days of peace” at the time of July 14. The Elysée however announced that he would express himself well, “in the next few days”without specifying the framework of this intervention.
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Established by Valéry Giscard d’Estaing in 1978 to modernize its communication, the July 14 interview quickly became a must, a last address to the French before summer. It allowed a contradictory meeting to defend the results of the year and outline the challenges of the start of the school year. The tradition continued during the mandates of François Mitterrand and Jacques Chirac, before being interrupted during the five-year term of Nicolas Sarkozy and resumed under that of François Hollande.
Emmanuel Macron, he had undertaken to give it up completely, before backpedaling in 2020, after a violent first wave of Covid-19, and after his re-election in 2022, a few months after the start of the war in Ukraine.
2017: “Jupiterian” communication
As soon as he came to power, the rare, locked and solemn communication adopted by Emmanuel Macron earned him the nickname of President “Jupiterian”. It is therefore without real surprise that he chose, two months after taking office, to give up the tradition of the July 14 interview, for this year and the following ones. The Elysée then assures the World that there is not “no refusal of obstacle with the press” and argues that the “complex thinking” of the new President of the Republic does not lend itself to the format of the interview, which provokes an outcry in the opposition. For only appearance, the Head of State chooses German newspapers and the regional daily press, granting West France an interview on July 13 in which he wants to reform France and the European Union.
Emmanuel Macron prefers to establish his own annual tradition by speaking, at the beginning of July 2017, before the deputies and senators gathered in Congress in Versailles. The newly elected president announces the course for the coming year, without answering questions from parliamentarians. A proven method “monarchical” by La France insoumise and the Communist Party, which boycotted the event.
2018: still no interview despite low popularity
In 2018, Emmanuel Macron did it again with a speech before the Congress of Versailles in early July. If 900 parliamentarians are present, the president is once again qualified as“authoritarian” by the opposition. July 9 is an opportunity for him to defend his first year in office in a context where he is strongly criticized, even within the majority, explains then The world. The popularity rating of the Head of State is also at its lowest since the beginning of his mandate: 71% of French people believe his policy “unfair”, according to an Odoxa survey for franceinfo. Taxed by “president of the rich” by the opposition, Emmanuel Macron and his government multiplies the unpopular announcements: postponement of the poverty plan, rejection of the Borloo plan for the suburbs, increase in the CSG or even speed limit to 80 km / h. In June, a video also shows him declaring in front of his advisers that social assistance costs a “crazy dough”.
2019: set back after the “yellow vests” crisis
At the end of the crisis of “yellow vests” and a great debate organized throughout France to announce social measures, Emmanuel Macron again refuses an interview for July 14. He is greeted by whistles during the parade on the Champs-Elysées. Having given up on bringing together parliamentarians in Congress at Versailles for the third consecutive year, his only interventions are limited to his traditional speech at the Ministry of the Armed Forces, on July 13, and an interview on franceinfo a few days earlier, following numerous controversies in the sports world.
2020: a rediscovered tradition, in the midst of a health crisis
An exceptional year, an exceptional system. While the first wave of Covid-19 hit the country hard and France emerged groggy from an initial confinement, Emmanuel Macron returned for the first time to the traditional television interview with a “14-July a little special”. The opportunity to announce new measures to combat the spread of the virus, which has already killed 30,000 people in the country. “We will be ready” for a second wave, assures the Head of State. Emmanuel Macron must speak to a country “deeply upset, traumatized”. By the health crisis first, but also by the economic and social crisis to come.
At the time of “whatever it takes”the interview outlines a recovery plan, to try to resist the 800,000 to one million possible new unemployed caused by the pandemic, at the same time postponing the pension reform. “Ihe method used during the first three years of the quinquennium has made it possible to make unprecedented reforms, which we thought were impossible“welcomes Emmanuel Macron, even if he recognizes “clumsiness sometimes“.
2021: a speech rather than an interview
Despite a still fierce health crisis, with successive waves, Emmanuel Macron does not try the experience of the television interview, preferring a speech of almost thirty minutes, on July 12. He salutes the government’s measures to fight the pandemic and the efforts of the French to support the economy. And announces, in particular, compulsory vaccination for people in direct contact with patients at risk, as well as the generalization of the health pass in restaurants and places of leisure.
2022: a second television interview on the repercussions of the war in Ukraine
Re-elected in May 2022, Emmanuel Macron responds to the exercise of the July 14 interview, this time under the sign of sobriety. Almost five months after the start of the war at the gates of Europe, “you have to be prepared for it to last”, he announces in the garden of the Elysée. Modernization of the army in a context of“war economy”announcement of an energy sobriety plan as Russia cuts its gas deliveries, call for sobriety from businesses and individuals… The President of the Republic draws the outlines of a difficult autumn, in a context of inflation, energy crisis and gradual exit from “whatever it takes”.
Emmanuel Macron had to face a difficult start to his five-year term, after losing his absolute majority in the National Assembly. He takes advantage of the National Day meeting to reaffirm the course of his five-year term: to make France “more independent”make the country a “ecological nation” and work for “equal opportunities in school, health and employment”. “We have to work harder and longer”, also declares the Head of State. The pension reform came out of the boxes and will trigger, a few months later, a major social and political conflict.