Éric Zemmour candidate to “save” France

(Paris) So that the French “feel at home again”, the far-right polemicist Eric Zemmour on Tuesday formalized his candidacy for the presidential election in a dramatic video, at the end of a restless pre-campaign and first backlash in the polls.

“I have decided to run for the presidential election,” he announced, reading a text behind a period microphone, mimicking the parallel with General de Gaulle’s appeal on June 18, 1940.

Paced by the 2^e movement of the 7^e Beethoven’s symphony, the video recorded two weeks ago, with nostalgic accents, mixes images of violence in France and archives from the country of “Notre-Dame-de-Paris and the bell towers”, the Concorde, the Arc de Triomphe or the cinema of “Gabin and Delon”.

The former columnist of CNews and Le Figaro explains, installed in front of a library, to address the French, “exiles from the interior”, to those who “feel foreign” in their “own country”, and to present themselves “to that our daughters are not veiled and that our sons are not submissive ”.

The 63-year-old polemicist sends back to back “well-thinkers, elites”, academics, journalists, trade unionists, as well as “Islamo-leftists” and supporters of “gender theory”.

At the same time, President Emmanuel Macron preferred to tweet about Joséphine Baker’s “universalism”, who entered the Pantheon on Tuesday.

“Gloomy”

After this announcement, which must be followed by an interview at 8 p.m. on TF1 – this time live – Eric Zemmour will hold his first campaign meeting on Sunday at the Zénith in Paris. The CGT, Solidaires and anti-fascist activists have already promised to demonstrate to “silence Zemmour”.

This speech is “gloomy” and “very little bearer of hope”, judge Sébastien Chenu, at the RN, embarrassed by this candidacy competing with that of Marine Le Pen on the far right.

On the right, the leader of LR deputies Damien Abad accuses Eric Zemmour of “fracturing” France.

On the left, LFI mocks a candidacy for the “1965 presidential election”. “The salon polemicist becomes an operetta candidate,” said PS spokesperson Boris Vallaud.

Éric Zemmour “sold us that he was the French Trump. It’s a Trump ordered on Wish, this counterfeit platform that sells stuff that doesn’t work, that is fake, ”snapped Gabriel Attal.

The polemicist comes out of a heckled visit to Marseille concluded Saturday with an exchange of fingers of honor with a passerby. A gesture “very inelegant”, had agreed Eric Zemmour.

Stanislas Rigault, who leads “Generation Z”, the candidate’s youth movement, recognized on BFMTV a “complicated” moment in Marseille, but hopes for a “filled” Zenith.

Sponsorships

Convicted twice for provocation to racial hatred, Eric Zemmour declares himself when the polls settle around 14 to 15% of voting intentions in the first round, behind outgoing President Emmanuel Macron (25%) and the candidate of RN Marine Le Pen (between 19 and 20%).

And in a turbulent period for his camp, where some criticize an organizational deficit or the omnipresence of his advisor Sarah Knafo.

By declaring himself Tuesday, he interferes with the LR investiture process who decide between their five suitors from Wednesday to Saturday, after a final debate on Tuesday evening.

On the far right, Marine Le Pen deplores that he “disperses voices useful for the recovery of the country”. “It does nothing,” she said, criticizing in particular his “brutality” on immigration or women.

Zemmour’s supporters pride themselves on having already weighed on the themes of the campaign, particularly on the fight against immigration and Islam, a “civilization” which he considers “incompatible with the principles of France”.

Follower of the conspiracy theory of the “great replacement” of the European population by non-European immigrants, its most controversial measure aims to ban the use of a first name of foreign origin.

The controversies multiplied during his pre-campaign. Especially when Eric Zemmour pointed a gun at journalists or went to the Bataclan, on the day of commemoration of November 13, to accuse former President François Hollande of “not protecting the French”.

After this announcement, the hardest part begins with the collection of the 500 sponsorships of elected officials necessary for a presidential candidacy. His camp ensures to rely on 250 to 300 sponsorship pledges.

He will also have to collect donations for his campaign, when he has already lost the support of financier Charles Gave, who lent him 300,000 euros.

The polemicist is also accused of sexual assault according to several testimonies of women collected by Mediapart. But no complaint has been announced against him.