appeal for donations, “emergency aid”, “war chest” … How the weak results of LR, EELV and PS weigh down their finances

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It’s time for reckoning and the bill looks heavy for some campaign teams. Only four candidates out of twelve exceeded the threshold of 5% of the votes in the first round of the presidential election, Sunday April 10: Emmanuel Macron, Marine le Pen, Jean-Luc Mélenchon and Eric Zemmour. The campaign expenses of the other eight will only be reimbursed up to 4.75%, instead of the expected 47.5%, according to the rule. They will be able to receive up to 800,000 euros and not 8 million, when the ceiling for authorized expenditure is 16.85 million for a candidate who does not reach the second round. The excessively low score of these candidates places certain parties, which often have to repay bank loans, in a delicate financial situation.

>> The day after the first round, follow in our live the reactions and the rest of the campaign the day after the first round

EELV “in great difficulty” calls for donations

Yannick Jadot did not go through four paths. Among the first candidates to speak on Sunday evening, the ecologist who obtained 4.63% of the vote launched a direct appeal for donations: “I invite you to go to the “Support the Ecologists” site to make a donation. (…) Ecology needs your financial support from this evening to continue its essential fights.”

“Ecology is in great difficulty”confirmed the national secretary of Europe Ecology-The Greens (EELV), Julien Bayou, on franceinfo. “To be able to carry out the legislative elections, to be able to continue to fight battles… Because we know that this five-year term will need the action of environmentalists. Yes, we need support”he added.

With two million euros to be found by the end of May, the situation is “critical”recognized Julien Bayou. “We had fortunately lowered the sails and spent less than we had planned”, he assured. MEP David Cormand invited on franceinfo “every one of our 1.5 million voters” to do “a donation of three euros” for “refund” the countryside.

According to the accounts published by his team, Yannick Jadot’s campaign required borrowing 7.6 million euros. With more than 6 million euros already spent, according to his entourage, 800,000 euros reimbursed by the State and 500,000 euros in donations, it is difficult to bring the accounts back into balance. Even if EELV came to its rescue, the party only had 6.2 million euros in cash in 2020, according to the annual review of the Commission of Campaign Accounts.

François Thiollet, co-treasurer of the party interviewed by franceinfo, remains optimistic: “We know how to manage in lean times and we will do ithe explains. The objective for us is to manage this debt so that it is extinguished in the next five years.”

Valérie Pécresse asks for “emergency aid”

Monday morning, with a serious face, Valérie Pécresse warned of the “critical situation” of the Republicans and launched an appeal to “emergency aid” French people for “close the financing” of his campaign. With 4.78% of the vote, the candidate signed the worst score of her camp under the Fifth Republic. “We have not reached the 5% that would allow us to obtain the 7 million euros in reimbursements from the State that we expected (…) Republicans can’t afford those expenses.”, she said before a political office of the party. Before adding: “I am personally in debt to the tune of 5 million euros.

A call for donations on the right: the approach is not without precedent. In 2013, the “Sarkothon” allowed the former UMP to raise more than 11 million euros to reimburse Nicolas Sarkozy’s campaign expenses. Senator Roger Karoutchi, however, declared a few minutes before the announcement of Valérie Pécresse “not sure” that this new kitty “have the same success”.

The president of the LR deputies, Christian Jacob, took care to specify to Release that the risk related to the “personal commitments” of Valérie Pécresse and not on the party. The candidate, whose net worth approaches 10 million euros, could have to manage without the support of her party.

LR would nevertheless have “the ability to cope” at this “difficult material situation”, assured Michel Barnier at the microphone of France Inter on Monday. This despite a reserve of only 3.5 million euros in 2020, according to the Campaign Accounts Commission.

The PS will dig into the “war chest” of its federations

Anne Hidalgo obtained only 1.75% of the votes. Nevertheless, the polls, which had long given it below the 5% threshold, had sounded like a warning. “As it was not completely certain to be reimbursed, everything was recalibrated”had explained to franceinfo a socialist framework. “We did not resort to a loan, we self-financed the campaign and therefore there is no debt to repay”, detailed the First Secretary, Olivier Faure, on franceinfo. At the end, “our campaign did not cost very much, it is a modest campaignassured AFP Senator Patrick Kanner, very well below 10 million”he assessed.

These millions not reimbursed by the state will not however fix the finances of the PS, which already posted a deficit of more than 3 million euros in 2020. The party was very weakened by the defeats of 2017, in the presidential and the legislative, which dried up its coffers, forcing it to sell its headquarters in the rue de Solférino and to launch a social plan among its employees.

This time, “It’s the federations that will put money in the pot. Certainly, we will reduce their war chest”said Patrick Kanner, saying that some are “financially very well managed”. Some of these federations “very well equipped” had nevertheless refused to put their hands in their pockets, in particular those of Moselle, Val-d’Oise and Corrèze. The boss of the PS, he does not exclude calls for donations which “are always necessary”. “But there is no bankruptcy as many would have liked.”


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