Éric Zemmour, now officially a candidate for the 2022 presidential election, “puts his finger on something that hurts, but I think it does not provide a solution and he has such an apocalyptic view of the world that it is scary” while he “must reassure people”, declared the various-right mayor of Béziers, supported by the National Gathering, Robert Ménard, Wednesday December 1 on franceinfo.
franceinfo: What did you think of Eric Zemmour’s candidacy video?
Robert Ménard: It looked like a sort of pastiche of General de Gaulle and we can still say who does he think he is? But at the same time, honestly, I was touched by a number of his images, his reminders. He still says how France is evolving. Even if I disagree with him, all was not better before and the France of the 1960s is perhaps not the paradise that Éric Zemmour presents. In addition, there is a kind of amateurism in his business of images. I am not sure that it is very successful overall even if Éric Zemmour has the merit of having put on the table questions which until then were little discussed. The Congressional Candidates Republicans have never talked so much about immigration.
After the official announcement of his candidacy, Eric Zemmour was interviewed in the newspaper of 20H of TF1. Then, he compared Gilles Bouleau to a “larva” and a “prosecutor”. Is he right to take it out on him?
Of course not. From you to me, I remember being received by Éric Zemmour on Laurent Ruquier’s show We are not in bed, you can’t say that the interviews he was doing were kind interviews to people. I’ve never seen flamethrower interviews like hers that made people cry. I think he was not very good on TF1, he was on the defensive, he was uncomfortable, we felt him, even darker, even more closed than usual. When you don’t pass an interview, you tend to either blame yourself or whoever asked you the questions. I’m not saying the questions were sympathetic, but he’s not the only one to be the subject of unfriendly questions. I have memories of Marine Le Pen received by journalists in an unpleasant way. He is in the wrong position to bring that trial. Honestly, this is not a good idea. I don’t even understand him to do it.
During the interview, he got carried away when asked about what he writes in his books on women, especially when he compares them to “booty” for men. Do you find his words shocking?
Of course it shocked me, but above all it shocks women. In the voting intentions, there are half as many women as men who are ready to vote for him. He has the words of a polemicist, of an intellectual who puts things in perspective. In a book, you can make shortcuts from one era to another. Today, facing the public now, it does not hold up. He has a point that is not stuck to current events, to today’s life.
“You cannot regret the 1960s, the years when women could not use contraception and abortion was totally prohibited.”
Robert Ménard, various right-wing mayor of Béziersto franceinfo
This is the reality. I think he doesn’t measure that. He says he’s had his moult, but no, obviously he didn’t and that’s why the machine is stalled right now. It’s a shame because he has a talent for talking about France. You may not like his video but he has a writing, a strength, a historical knowledge, he is a real intellectual, he says things that should challenge us but he may not be made to be a candidate.
You say he may not be cut out to be a candidate. Is he made to be President of the Republic, according to you?
If he is not made to be a candidate, he is unlikely to be made to be president. I think that today Eric Zemmour has shown the limits in this exercise, which is a shame. I told him from the start: you are more useful than anyone at asking a number of questions, including iconoclasts, questions that others do not want to ask. It will have had the merit of forcing us, overall, to look at the world as it is in front of us and today it continues to collect 12 or 14% of the voting intentions, that is to say more than any leftist candidate. There is a huge section of the media class or the political class that continues to deny the obvious. He’s pinpointing something that hurts, but I think he doesn’t provide a solution, and he has such an apocalyptic view of the world that it’s scary. You can’t tell people that we are on the verge of an apocalypse and that there is nothing we can do, it is not possible. Eric Zemmour’s performance will not reassure the French. We have to reassure them by telling them that if tomorrow we come to power there will be no insurrection, no civil war or conflagration in the suburbs. For that, we have to make proposals, Éric Zemmour does not and we have to reassure people, he is not reassuring.