How involved should Emmanuel Macron be?

Faced with the difficulties of his camp, the President of the Republic is considering various actions to support Valérie Hayer, head of the Renaissance list, including a debate with Marine Le Pen.

The final sprint of the European campaign is launched. Four weeks before the election, Monday May 13, Emmanuel Macon plans to get more involved. The majority candidate, Valérie Hayer, is in difficulty, lost by Jordan Bardella and followed closely by Raphaël Glucksmann. The head of state is therefore very tempted to go to the front line to come to his aid. With the intention of unmasking what he calls the “lies” of the National Rally, supporter, according to him, of a “Frexit” disguised. Nothing has been decided on the form of this commitment. Trip, letter to the French, meeting alongside Valérie Hayer or even, perhaps, a televised duel with Marine Le Pen. Nothing is excluded.

During a European campaign, such a debate would be a first and quite a risk-taking! First, because the Head of State would thus, in fact, make the European vote a pro or anti-Macron referendum, which is precisely what the RN wants. At the Élysée, we consider that the president remains the main asset of the majority in the campaign. Given his current unpopularity, it is not impossible that he has also become his burden. The speech on Europe that he delivered at the Sorbonne on April 25 had no effect in the polls. A televised duel with Marine Le Pen would, moreover, steal the spotlight from Gabriel Attal, who has decided to face Jordan Bardella on France 2 in ten days.

Marine Le Pen’s reflection

Marine Le Pen doesn’t seem to really want it. Officially, she is “always up for grabs” to debate, but not before “september”, or after the Europeans. In fact, the leader of the far right is hesitating. On the one hand, such a televised duel would allow him to not let Jordan Bardella benefit solely from a success at the polls on June 9. Marine Le Pen fears that her protégé will feel like he is growing wings if he exceeds the threshold of 30% of the votes on June 9. Such success, unprecedented in the history of the far right, could whet its appetite for 2027 and Marine Le Pen would do well to claim a good part of it. But she also retains a bitter memory of her spectacular failures during her two televised duels against Emmanuel Macron in 2017 and 2022.

She doesn’t have a crazy desire to do it again, and even less to find herself confronted with the contradictions of the RN’s European project. Setting up Emmanuel Macron as a scarecrow to mobilize his troops, but without daring to confront him, is undoubtedly a more profitable tactic.