The headquarters of the consulting firm McKinsey, the Renaissance party of Emmanuel Macron and its financing association were raided on Tuesday in Paris as part of the investigations into the conditions of intervention of the consulting firms, in particular in the electoral campaigns of the president. French in 2017 and 2022.
These searches were conducted by the investigating judges in charge of two judicial inquiries opened in October, the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF) said on Wednesday, confirming information from the daily The Parisian.
One of them concerns the intervention of consulting firms in Emmanuel Macron’s 2017 and 2022 election campaigns, the other on the more general use of these firms by the State, according to sources familiar with the matter. .
“McKinsey confirms the holding on December 13 of visit operations led by an investigating judge at the headquarters of McKinsey France in Paris,” the firm said in a press release, ensuring “to fully cooperate with the public authorities, as has always been the case. been the case”.
“In its press release of November 24, the PNF indicated that it had opened a judicial investigation into the conditions of intervention of consulting firms in the electoral campaigns of 2017 and 2022, following complaints from elected officials and associations” , for his part reacted to AFP the spokesperson for Renaissance, Loïc Signor.
“It is normal for the judiciary to investigate freely and independently to shed light on this issue,” he added, adding that the party was at the disposal of the judges “to communicate to them any useful information on the campaigns. mentioned in the course of their investigations”.
” I fear nothing “
During the last presidential campaign, a Senate report sparked heated debate on the use of public funds for the benefit of these cabinets. The opposition had called for an investigation into the possible favoritism which McKinsey would have benefited from from the Macronist majority.
Published on March 16, this report initiated by the republican communist citizen and environmentalist group assured that the contracts concluded between the State and the cabinets had “more than doubled” from 2018 to 2021, for a record amount of more than 1 billion euros. euros in 2021.
He also pointed to a possible tax arrangement of the French entities of McKinsey which would have allowed them to pay no corporate tax between 2011 and 2020.
On March 31, the PNF had opened a preliminary investigation for aggravated laundering of tax evasion to verify the merits of these latest accusations.
As part of this investigation, a search had already been carried out at the French headquarters of the firm on May 24.
Then on October 20 and 21, the PNF entrusted investigating magistrates with a judicial investigation for non-compliant keeping of campaign accounts and reduction of accounting elements in a campaign account, and another for favoritism and concealment of favoritism.
According to the online news site Mediapartsome members of the cabinet could have worked for free for the victorious presidential campaign of Emmanuel Macron in 2017.
“I fear nothing and […] I believe that the heart of the investigation is not your servant, “reacted the head of state in November.
If the investigating magistrates were to consider that Emmanuel Macron must explain himself on these questions, they could summon him at the end of his second term at the Élysée, and only on the acts which were not committed in the exercise of his duties as President.
For his part, the Minister of Economy and Finance Bruno Le Maire acknowledged “abuses” in the past in the use of ministries to consulting firms like McKinsey, but considered that this habit was now “corrected”.
In a confidential report whose existence was revealed by the daily The world Monday, the Court of Auditors observed that several consultancy contracts had been concluded by the State under “problematic” conditions during the health crisis.