(Paris) Three days before the election, Emmanuel Macron will grant an interview on Thursday as eagerly awaited as it is contested by opposition to the 8 p.m. news on the occasion of the 80e anniversary of the Landings, while the candidates throw their last strength into the European campaign.
The longest hours? On the eve of the end of the official campaign, the executive as well as the aspiring MEPs are trying as much to mobilize their troops as to convince the abstainers – around half of those registered do not currently intend to go to the polls -or the many undecided people.
Major offensive, the head of state must speak on TF1, France 2, but also LCI and FranceInfo.
Certainly, the 80e anniversary of the Normandy Landings, duly celebrated during the day at Omaha Beach in the presence of around twenty heads of state and government, is put forward by the Élysée to justify the intervention. The interview could allow him to announce additional aid to Ukraine but also to address the European election, to the great dismay of the oppositions, who have contacted Arcom.
The audiovisual policeman had to remind Tuesday that “all or part of the remarks made during this interview could be taken into account” in the speaking time of the list of the presidential camp and the other lists should benefit in return from “equitable access” to the antennas.
The head of state is “obsessed with only one thing: it is the score of the National Rally on Sunday”, quipped head of list RN Jordan Bardella on Europe1-Cnews on Thursday. “If Emmanuel Macron does not come very far behind the list of the National Rally, he will feel himself growing wings and he will accelerate,” he added, citing the increase in the price of gas, the reform of the unemployment insurance or the deindexation of retirement pensions.
Conversely, Prime Minister Gabriel Attal dramatized the stakes of the vote on France 2 in the face of the expected victory of the far right on Sunday. “Europe was born thanks to France, it must not die because of France,” he declared, repeating his refusal that “the face of France in Europe is changing from that of Simone Veil (former president of the European Parliament, Editor’s note) to that of Marine Le Pen.
PHOTO JORDAN PETTITT, VIA REUTERS
French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal
“To make people believe that the issue should be dramatized […] it is in truth serving the RN”, reacted, ulcerated, the head of the LR list François-Xavier Bellamy from Cannes Thursday morning deploring the use of the “landing beaches to organize the staging of this aberrant fight which does not correspond nothing in Europe.
Despite the notable involvement of the head of government for several days in the campaign, the list of the presidential majority is slipping in the polls: 15% of voting intentions, according to an Ifop study published on Wednesday, very far behind that of the RN, credited with 33%.
Valérie Hayer must hold her last rally on Thursday, alongside Edouard Philippe, in Nice.
The Côte-d’Azur has also established itself as the center of the end of the campaign having hosted the public meetings of Mr. Bellamy (LR) and Marion Maréchal (Reconquête!) the day before, the latter coming close to the threshold of 5% voting intentions which allows MEPs to be sent to the Strasbourg hemicycle.
Eva Joly, Martine Aubry
The head of the Europe-Ecologie-Les Verts list, Marie Toussaint, faced with the same risk, will try to reverse the trend by appearing on Thursday noon during a Parisian campaign with Eva Joly, the unsuccessful candidate of the ecologists for the presidential election of 2012, still very popular in his party.
Her competitor from La France insoumise, Manon Aubry (8% voting intentions), is expected in the evening in Lyon in the presence of Jean-Luc Mélenchon.
The radical left movement has in recent days stepped up its efforts in working-class neighborhoods, which it perceives as the greatest reservoirs of potential votes.
Several of his lieutenants took part in a large door-to-door campaign on Wednesday in a district of Ivry-sur-Seine, in the southern suburbs of Paris, before organizing a similar exercise on Friday in Marseille.
With 13.5% voting intentions, the PS, whose list is led by Raphaël Glucksmann, intends to regain the advantage among the parties of the ex-Nupes, especially if it achieves the feat of rising in second place on the podium – which no poll has yet promised him, but the gap which separates him from the Macronists is within the margin of error.
Last boost expected by Mr. Glucksmann: that of Martine Aubry, during a gathering in her city of Lille, Friday evening. Just before the silence imposed on all the candidates until the ballots are counted.