It is a campaign argument that Michel Barnier never fails to recall. August 26 in Le Figaro : “I have always been loyal to my political family, which I have never left.” September 25 on his Twitter account : “A loyal activist in this family since my first engagement in Savoy, I will confidently solicit his support to bring together and win the presidential election.” Or on April 14 in Les Echos du Touquet : “I am in my political family, that of the Republicans, which I have never left.”
Loyalty to the party all the more hammered home by the former Brexit negotiator as it could prove to be decisive. In the race for the LR nomination, Xavier Bertrand and Valérie Pécresse, Michel Barnier’s two main rivals, were criticized, on the contrary, for their infidelity to the Republicans, slamming the party door with a bang (in 2017 for the first, in 2019 for the second) before re-enrolling very recently. In contrast, the constancy claimed by Michel Barnier is one of the main reasons for his popularity among activists, the only ones allowed to vote at the investiture congress. The former European commissioner is thus considered by many on the right as the favorite in this internal ballot: a trend confirmed by our recent survey of LR federation presidents.
However, according to our information, there is a flaw in Michel Barnier’s story. We obtained the complete file of LR members as of December 31, 2019. A list of 184,090 names of activists up to date with or without contribution, with, for each, last name, first name, membership federation, date of the last contribution, current status, membership number, address, personal phone and email, as well as their date of birth. At the line “Barnier Michel”, born the “01/09/1951” and registered with the LR federation of Paris, it is written “member not up to date”. His last contribution to the party even dates back to June 8, 2018.
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Contacted, the entourage of the candidate does not deny. He sent us this response: “Michel Barnier joined the Gaullist movement at the age of 15 and has always remained faithful to it. (…) You have never heard him say on the 8 o’clock news that he was leaving his political family!” Without specifying when his situation was regularized.
“In the midst of Brexit negotiations, it may be possible that there was a delay in a renewal date for his membership.”
The entourage of Michel Barnierto franceinfo
Also requested, the leadership of the Republicans does not prefer to comment on our information, simply recalling that “what matters is that everyone is united and gathered today in the LR family”.
To understand why Michel Barnier did not renew his card at LR in 2019, we have to put ourselves in the context of the time. That year, the Savoyard was European commissioner, responsible for negotiating Brexit. On May 26, the European elections are to be held in France. If the former minister ended up supporting the LR list led by François-Xavier Bellamy, he would have, in the months preceding the election, tried behind the scenes to reach an agreement with La République en Marche, the party of President Emmanuel Macron, which ‘he may face off in April 2022.
In any case, this is assured by a senior executive from LREM whom we contacted. “The loyalty that Barnier proclaims to his party makes me laugh, he confides. At the Europeans, he was ready to join us and he was very greedy. He even wanted to be the top of the En Marche list. And it is because we did not want to give him the head of the list that he returned to LR. “ Before adding: “He would have liked to be Macron’s candidate for the presidency of the European Commission” in 2019. Asked also on this precise point, the entourage of Michel Barnier denies. “On the contrary, since he publicly supported the LR list for Europeans in 2019.”
The congress to nominate the Republican candidate for 2022 is scheduled for December 1-4. In addition to Michel Barnier, five candidates are in the running: Xavier Bertrand, Valérie Pécresse, Eric Ciotti, Philippe Juvin and Denis Payre. According to our information, all six, including Michel Barnier, are up to date with their contributions.