The founder of La France insoumise recently highlighted the deputy of the Somme, with a view to the next presidential election. Four years from the deadline, the entourage of François Ruffin prefers to play it safe, but notes his growing influence within Nupes.
It all started with a poll, in line with those against which the elected representatives of La France insoumise are used to vituperating. On April 11, the Cluster 17 institute publishes an opinion poll on the voting intentions of the French people if the presidential election is held in stride. On the left, two candidates emerge: Jean-Luc Mélenchon, with 24% of “probable” or “possible” voting intentions, and François Ruffin, at 21%. The next day, the triple candidate for the Elysée tweeted his satisfaction, and even a little more: “Magnificent Cluster survey. François Ruffin and I have passed the 20% mark. All the work accomplished over the past year has not been lost in the sand of the permanent bashing against me. François is ready. Forward!”
Since then, everyone has given their interpretation of this sibylline formula. “It’s more of a trap than anything else”assures an ecologist deputy, while an LFI parliamentarian reads “a certain trickery”. “If I wanted to designate a guy, I wouldn’t do it like that! He wanted to trap him by forcing him out of the woods”wants to believe a socialist. “It is the reward for the work that François Ruffin has been doing for years”supports for his part Damien Maudet, one of his relatives.
“Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s tweet is neither an endorsement nor a maneuver.”
Damien Maudet, LFI deputy for Haute-Vienneat franceinfo
The first concerned procrastinates, four years from the deadline. “It’s nice, but now is not the time. There is a lonely man up there. We need a plural team in front”swept François Ruffin, on franceinfo, mid-April. “He does not want to get carried away, we must not play cretins”, says Alexis Corbière, MP LFI. If he refuses for the moment to take on the role of presidential on the left, the deputy of the Somme has seen the eyes of his comrades on the left evolve. “Since Jean-Luc Mélenchon’s tweet, there are colleagues who come to see him, it’s interesting”notes Damien Maudet.
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“Jean-Luc Mélenchon does not offer any political outlet. At least François Ruffin reassures and brings people together. We feel that he is provoking interest, he would make a good candidate”judges an ecologist deputy. “The incarnation of the new French-style social democracy, wouldn’t that be him?”dares a member of the majority, who “could[t] say things he says”.
Compliments up to the majority
For the moment, François Ruffin warms up and lends an attentive ear to what the Nupes says about him. “He already plays a central role on the left”assures LFI deputy Eric Coquerel. “It is personalities like him who mobilize, it denotes a form of political base and a form of recognition which reflects on all territories”engages the ecologist Marie-Charlotte Garin, who has held several meetings with him in recent months. “He is one of those who can draw prospects within the Nupes”adds the patron saint of EELV deputies, Cyrielle Chatelain.
The Amiens is well aware of this. He multiplies the trips, formulates proposals, such as the establishment of a citizens’ initiative referendum advocated by the “yellow vests”, consults here and there. “He felt something and understood that he had to have coffee”, laughs a socialist deputy. He makes contacts beyond the Nupes, too. As when he exchanged with Renaissance MP Astrid Panosyan-Bouvet during a strike by home helpers in Domidom last year. “François Ruffin had a role that made this fight more visible and ensured that it concerned an entire profession. It surprised me that it was someone who was not in personal staging”praises the Macronist parliamentarian, who salutes “its substantive proposals and this approach to responsibility”.
“He starts from people and talks about people.”
Astrid Panosyan-Bouvet, Renaissance MPat franceinfo
“François Ruffin is refocusing, it’s good news”, believes another member of the majority. He, the author of “the party at Macron”, which he says has a “form of madness”would he be ready to lead a union of the radical left in the center? “François Ruffin never proposed it. He is opposed to it, like all those who participate in the rebellious movement, in any form whatsoever”, denied Jean-Luc Mélenchon in a blog post. Still, the deputy of the Somme, elected against the National Rally, does not refrain from discussing with the presidential camp. “He knows how to build an alliance and take the right macronist” on specific files, summarizes Damien Maudet.
A less divisive discourse to “breathe”
In form, François Ruffin’s transformation is more noticeable. The image of the “deputy reporter”, in a football shirt in the hemicycle, belongs to the past. The founder of the newspaper Fakir regularly wears the costume and has “no longer want to scream on the benches of the Assembly”as he recently told France Inter. “Since I’ve calmed down, I’ve had a lot of new friends. So much the better. But (…) if I’ve changed, it’s true, in my expression, I vary little in my convictions”he specified on his blog, at the beginning of May.
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“Between 2017 and 2022, his perception evolved: with 17 ‘rebellious’ deputies, it was more difficult to win a vote than today, so it was essential to be heard. Today, he didn’t no longer need to do this for his word to carry, he can show that he calmly defends his ideasdecrypts Damien Maudet, who was his parliamentary assistant. People are looking for appeasement, there is a certain resignation in the country. What François embodies is being able to breathe.” An attitude that contrasts with the incidents provoked by deputies from La France insoumise in the Assembly in recent months. For this chosen Renaissance, the strategy could pay off.
“He understood that LFI’s strategy of chaos was no longer in tune with the times, it’s politically well done.”
A Renaissance MPat franceinfo
Appreciated within the Nupes, not hated on the side of the majority, is François Ruffin however able to impose himself within La France insoumise? The elected official of the Somme, at the head of his micro-party, Picardie Debout, can only count for the moment on a handful of deputies aligned with his positions, including Damien Maudet or Christophe Bex, who came from the “yellow vests” . “He can train others at LFIbet another elected member of his group. If everyone is looking for a candidate, he could be the one. Once he’s in the air, you can shoot him, he doesn’t fall.”
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Last fall, François Ruffin applied to join the new management of LFI. With others, like Alexis Corbière or Clémentine Autain, he was dismissed in favor of those close to Jean-Luc Mélenchon. And it is with this “Mélenchon generation” that relations are the freshest today. “We can talk about an alliance of circumstance, like a relationship of partners-rivals, with hidden tensions”analyzes Manuel Cervera-Marzal, researcher and author of a Sociology of La France insoumise (La Découverte editions).
“What François Ruffin brings to LFI is proof of a pluralist movement. He manages to speak to certain sections of the electorate in which Jean-Luc Mélenchon is not very good.”
Manuel Cervera-Marzal, researcherat franceinfo
This France of “angry not fachos”, seduced by the National Rally without fully adhering to the discourse of the far-right party, this is the target of François Ruffin since his emergence in politics, in 2016. Seven years have passed since his speeches at Nuit Debout and its documentary Thanks boss !. The former journalist has earned his stripes, but the panoply of the presidential is not complete on the merits, judge some. “It takes years of work to gain depth on many subjects, such as the international or the Sixth Republic”, points out a parliamentarian from Nupes. His entourage sweeps away any blind spot in this early bird. “It works in sequencesjustifies Damien Maudet. He treats a subject in depth to be able to talk about it. Defense and security, he has had less opportunity to work on it, but he will come to it because he wants to learn and progress.”
The need to “kill the father”?
On the form, criticisms also surface. “He is not very comfortable in speech and debate. It is hard to imagine him as president”slice an elected socialist. “He does not have a classic political speech, but it sometimes lacks a bit of formcontinues one of his colleagues. To presidentialize the character, you have to work on the form of the speech, to develop a story that comes out of the juxtaposition of testimonies.
Does François Ruffin have to change to win in the years to come? “We mustn’t belittle the disruptive aspect of our program, that’s what made LFI so successful”warns Eric Coquerel. “We must move from craftsmanship to a more industrial enterprise”illustrates Alexis Corbière. “He has a lot to do if he wants to go all the way”anticipates another LFI deputy.
Becoming the key figure of the radical left after Jean-Luc Mélenchon is one of them. “Naturally, this match does not exist and will never exist”recently swept the ex-leader of LFI about this hypothetical war of succession. “Does François Ruffin want to kill the father? Emmanuel Macron did it, Nicolas Sarkozy too”, recalls an adviser to the executive. Will Nupes experience its Oedipal moment before 2027?