We knew Valérie Pécresse, minister, president of Île-de-France, party patron … Here she is transformed into a VRP, specialty: membership at LR. “Hello, this is Valérie Pécresse. I want to present my candidacy for the Congress of Republicans for the presidential election, exposes the candidate in a voice message sent in recent days. To be able to vote at this congress, you must register online before November 16 on the website Républicains.fr“. Direct call for memberships, and first salvo in the Yvelines at the end of last week, currently in Paris. One or two other strategic departments will also be targeted, preferably where the candidate could not go.
In total, several thousand phone calls will have gone through a service provider, which also has a cost, around 50 cents per message sent, we are told. Illustration of the stake of these new memberships and therefore of these future potential voters for the candidate. What provoke the mockery of a support from Xavier Bertrand: “She is not sure of her ability to convince, so she tries to change the electorate“.
Valérie Pécresse is not the only one to use this kind of process. As to admit it, each camp refers to the other: the teams of Michel Barnier invite to turn to the Bertrand camp and assure for example not to practice “phoning”, even if they admit sending emails to their own. file. Conversely, the teams of the President of Hauts-de-France guarantee not to make targeted and massive phone calls.
Anyway, everyone swears it: we respect the rules. Because the subject is very sensitive. Valérie Pécresse’s campaign director, Patrick Stéfanini, seized the supervisory body of LR a week ago on appeals from the Barnier and Bertrand camps to members barely inserted, which would be potentially disturbing. In the process, the representative of Xavier Bertrand within the body also complained about these practices.
A question then arose: do some stables have access to the membership file? It is strictly forbidden, but in any case, difficult to prove. When in doubt, the boss of the control body, Senator Philippe Bas, warned about the risk of “maneuver likely to taint the regularity of the ballot”. Clearly, thank you for stopping. “The arrival of the press release threw a chill“, laughs a LR, which probably explains why everyone is discreet on the subject.
As for Valérie Pécresse, who ensures that everything is done according to the rules, her voicemail messages have still reached the voicemail boxes of certain journalists. Attempt to justify support: “It is probably a number error“.