for 2024 LR wants to run a campaign different from the previous election

For a week, François-Xavier Bellamy has officially been the head of the Republican list for the European elections on June 9. His campaign will not look like that of 2019.

The LR campaign for the European elections is still in the development phase but there is already a slogan: do not take the revenue from 2019. To have beautiful images, there will of course be some large meetings but much less than in the last Europeans. François-Xavier Bellamy held around fifty meetings in 2019. “It was very unnecessary,” we recognize at LR because those who come are already convinced. In front of the world and the enthusiasm in the rooms, “we were self-intoxicated”, admits five years after François-Xavier Bellamy.

A euphoria which resulted in a small 8.48% at the polls. So the multiplication of meetings which conclude almost every trip to the field will not be on the program in 2024. François-Xavier Bellamy is thinking about other formats, to exchange with the French and put them “in the center of the countryside”, without falling into the big debates, Emmanuel Macron version. The candidate will see the party boss, Éric Ciotti, during the week of Monday January 22, to discuss the subject.

Searching for a key message

Basically, it’s the same: there’s no point in replaying 2019. At the time, LR had a program with 70 proposals. “It was serious, explains François-Xavier Bellamy, but we didn’t have an overall story.” The right is therefore looking for the key message, and a few strong measures or even a single symbol… LR’s dream is to find the new “Work more to earn more” who brought Nicolas Sarkozy to the Élysée in 2007. The urgency is to have the strong argument which will convince voters that having LR MEPs is useful, while the right is sandwiched between the macronie and the National Rally. To face headwinds, the right wants to show that it has a track record in Brussels, and play the contrast with Jordan Bardella, not very present in the European Parliament, but also with Renaissance which the right accuses of leaning more often to the left, even on the green side in Brussels.

Candidate Bellamy will also work to bring together the right behind him. After seeing the LR deputies last week, he has a meeting on Tuesday January 23 with the LR group in the Senate. “No one has any interest in making less than 5%.” urges a party leader. Just to encourage everyone to row in the same direction during this campaign.