On this hot Parisian afternoon, some are taking their first steps in the National Assembly, others are returning to the seat they temporarily left after the dissolution. Smiling, feverish or stressed, the deputies elected or re-elected during the legislative elections met on Thursday, July 18, for the election to the presidency of the institution. While this election does not usually excite the crowds, the cameras have rarely been so numerous in the room of the four columns, and many foreign media outlets have made the trip to cover this strange session.
Fragmented as never before, the hemicycle faced the challenge of finding its very first consensus. It took three rounds and nearly six hours to decide between the six candidates. At 8:31 p.m., the suspense was broken by a message posted on X by the presidential party (and since deleted) announcing the victory of the incumbent Yaël Braun-Pivet, even before the official results. A handful of minutes later, when these were announced from the rostrum, the deputies did not seem at all surprised. The presidential camp politely applauded the re-elected incumbent, who won with a 13-vote lead over the communist André Chassaigne, the sole candidate of the New Popular Front, whose troops, silent, were reeling from the blow.
It all started at 3 p.m. with a speech by the dean of the Assembly, as required by the rules. National Rally MP José Gonzalez, criticized in 2022 for having, in the same role, given a speech with hints of nostalgia for French Algeria, this time smoothed out his remarks. As if the party was now more concerned about controlling its image, after a complicated legislative campaign. He made the Assembly staff applaud, but then provoked some protests in the chamber when he denounced “baroque alliances”in reference to the withdrawals to block his party.
In a very solemn atmosphere, the first round of voting begins. One by one, from the letter F to E, the deputies take turns at the podium to slip their envelope into the green ballot box. A monotonous ritual disturbed by a few very political signals, when several rebellious deputies refuse to shake the hand extended by the RN Flavien Termet, who supervises the vote as the youngest member of the Assembly. After an hour of counting, the results announced do not surprise: each candidate received the support of his group and no one reaches the absolute majority, necessary to win before the third round.
Having come out on top, André Chassaigne is widely applauded by the fragile left-wing alliance, which dreams of regaining some colour while its negotiations on Matignon have become bogged down. But behind the scenes, an agreement is being reached between the Macronists and the right, whose candidate, Philippe Juvin, is withdrawing. What facilitate the re-election of Yäel Braun-Pivet, in exchange for other key positions in the Assembly, the allocation of which is to continue until Saturday.
In the corridors of the Palais-Bourbon, this tacit agreement is assumed by Renaissance, a little less by Les Républicains. “We don’t want to unravel a number of public policies that are close to our hearts, like the right and the social democrats. It involves putting the right people in the right place.”explains Olga Givernet, vice-president of Ensemble pour la République, the new name of the Renaissance group. She confirms that discussions have been taking place with the right for several days. On the side of the Republican Right, the group from LR, we prefer to highlight the “sense of responsibility”. “It is not a question of a deal, but of the functioning of the Assembly, we want to avoid any institutional blockage”assures Anne-Laure Blin, spokesperson for the group.
With the withdrawal of Philippe Juvin and the Horizons candidate Naïma Moutchou, Yaël Braun-Pivet can hope for a good transfer of votes. On the other hand, the RN Sébastien Chenu chose to stay, a change of strategy compared to 2022, when the abstention of Marine Le Pen’s troops had allowed Yaël Braun-Pivet to win in the second round, with the absolute majority of votes cast. “At the time, the Macronists came out on top in the legislative elections! This is no longer the case”tackles the RN Jean-Philippe Tanguy, under the sun, in the garden of the Assembly. His colleague Franck Allisio prefers to denounce the “sanitary cordon” decided by the presidential party group to deprive the extreme right of strategic positions. He holds it against Yaël Braun-Pivet: “It is not clear whether the rules are being followed.”.
Feverish, some quickly smoke a cigarette in the garden before returning to the chamber. “It’s over”whispers a close friend of the centrist Charles de Courson. Eelected since 1993, the Marnais only collected 18 votes in the first round. During the previous legislature, he had nevertheless managed to unite well beyond his small Liot group, by embodying a counter-power to the Borne government during the pension reform. “The only solution was Charles, an independent man, who would have been the guarantor of the institutions. The NFP could have supported him, but they preferred Macron to Courson!”
A few steps away, this deal concluded with the right is already putting a smile back on the faces of Emmanuel Macron’s troops, despite being punished at the ballot box on July 7. “Yaël Braun-Pivet will be in the lead in the second round”calculates Renaissance MP Ludovic Mendes. Everyone does their sums: with the 48 votes from the right and the 38 from Horizons, the Macronist candidate can garner 210 votes, and overtake André Chassaigne. The results of the second round confirm this arithmetic and give him an eight-vote lead before the third, which will inevitably be decisive: a relative majority is now enough to win. Only Charles de Courson throws in the towel, and the only suspense concerns the transfer of the 12 votes that had gone to him.
Nearly two hours later, hopes of a comeback André Chassaigne’s opponents are showered: he is 13 votes short of catching up with his rivalThe left has paid the price of a strategy of “anything but the NFP” that the rebel Eric Coquerel said he feared before the first round. “We came out on top [des législatives], We’ve been saying it for three weeks, we showed it again in the first roundbut there are scams being organized to block us, it’s quite sickening”denounces LFI MP Sarah Legrain. “The vote of the French” to the legislative elections “was stolen by an unnatural alliance”thunders André Chassaigne at the end of the session. For once in unison, the NFP bigwigs castigate what they describe as a denial of democracy, and denounce the “illegal vote”according to Jean-Luc Mélenchon, of the 17 resigning ministers, who returned to the benches of the Assembly while they continue to manage current affairs.
This is a hard blow for the NFP, which has been mired since July 7 in endless discussions that are rekindling tensions between partners. The four groups in the left-wing coalition have finally joined the opposition, as long as Emmanuel Macron does not appoint a designated Prime Minister from their camp. A prospect that is now distant, Macronist deputies and the right want to believe. But the lessons of this election remain difficult to draw.
The presidential camp may have lost ground in the legislative elections, and may have fewer deputies than the left-wing alliance, but it still holds the presidency of the Assembly. The right may have done the Macronists a favor by saving Yaël Braun-Pivet, but her group has joined the opposition. “We want to remain a pivotal group”pleads Anne-Laure Blin. Those who were hoping for clarification may be disappointed, as will those who called for calm in the chamber. The first words of the re-elected president had barely resonated in the Palais-Bourbon when a cry was already rising from the ranks of the left: “The French didn’t vote for you!” And Yaël Braun-Pivet promised in vain “to move more towards dialogue, compromise”his words did not appease the anger of the left.
The question of the ability of a coalition to govern, or at least to pass certain texts in the Assembly, is far from being resolved. The distribution of key posts in the Palais-Bourbon on Friday and Saturday could confirm the emerging rapprochement with the centre-right, or on the contrary erode it. “If we lose today against a motley alliance, we will find ourselves at the start of the school year with a motion of censure”predicted Eric Coquerel before the result of the vote. The equation for forming a government is still very far from being resolved.