Within the majority, the episode will remain as a marker. It is past 6 p.m., Tuesday, October 11, when, from the perch of the Palais-Bourbon, Yaël Braun-Pivet issues a call to order with regard to a member of his own camp, Astrid Panosyan-Bouvet. “You used the word ‘xenophobic’ towards a political party. I had just reminded you that you have to have a respectful attitude towards each other”, blows the president of a National Assembly without an absolute majority. In question: the denunciation by the deputy Renaissance of “50-year-old xenophobic DNA” of the National Rally.
.@YaelBRAUNPIVET sanctions @AstridPanosyan a call to order: “You used the word ‘xenophobic’ at the podium with regard to a political party. I had just reminded you that you had to have a respectful attitude towards each other”. #DirectAN pic.twitter.com/xIFEXBx6Wk
—LCP (@LCP) October 11, 2022
That day, the atmosphere was electric in the hemicycle. Two hours before this incident, during questions to the government, two calls to order had already been made against RN deputies Alexandre Loubet and Frédéric Boccaletti, for having respectively qualified ministers Bruno Le Maire and Pap Ndiaye as “cowardly” and of “communitarian”. Although a member of the majority, Astrid Panosyan-Bouvet was therefore housed in the same boat.
“It was complex to make this decision but it had to be done so as not to favor a political group”, defends a Renaissance deputy. But among other macronists, the outcry is immediate. “The deputies of the group are furious”loose a figure of the majority, before ensuring that it is necessary “obviously being able to confront the RN with its history”. “It is unacceptable”, does not get angry either a framework of the presidential party. In two sentences, the latter sums up the sentiment shared by others within the macronie: “We have a problem with her superneutrality, which becomes embarrassing. She considers that she must apply the same treatment to everyone”.
Feeling the wind of the sling coming, Yaël Braun-Pivet had to explain himself on the Telegram loop of the Renaissance deputies, stressing that “respect is an essential condition for debate”.
“In an electrical context where the slightest spark could create the fire, I endeavored to allow the progress of the debates and to prevent the escalation.”
Yaël Braun-Pivet, President of the National Assemblyto Renaissance deputies
This lawyer by training also texted Astrid Panosyan-Bouvet to tell her that she was “sorry”, but that she could not do otherwise. However, even within the RN, Marine Le Pen believes that this declaration “did not justify a call to order”. “She puts the cursor too low, but it must not be easy, she is under pressure from her own camp, from ministers”, judges the former presidential finalist. “She is also a woman and we probably allow ourselves, in this camp, more things than if she were a man.”
“For the moment, I have nothing to say. She is rather respectful of the composition of the National Assembly that the French have chosen.”
Marine Le Pen, president of the RN group at the Assemblyat franceinfo
Marine Le Pen is not the only one, in the opposition, to salute the way in which Yael Braun-Pivet exercises his function, which has the gift of annoying within the majority. Sometimes bordering on sexism. “She simpers, she seeks to be loved by her opponents”plague a macronist.
On the LR side, we are fully satisfied with the debut of Yaël Braun-Pivet on the perch. “She is very strong, she has a lot of qualities. We manage to work with her and get a lot of stuff across, it’s going well”, enthused a right-wing party official. We are a little more measured at the PS. “She is doing her job as president, she is doing what she can in a very complicated context”, recognizes the leader of the Socialist deputies, Boris Vallaud. The member for Landes would like, however, that she “tighten the rope” with the government to achieve more compromise.
And that is the whole dilemma of Yael Braun Pivet: “to be loyal to the president and his majority, while ensuring a neutral presidency of the National Assembly”, summarizes a macronist. SOn the finance bill (PLF), the former president of the Assembly’s law commission is aligned with the government. Fierce supporter of “dialogue” – a word she hammered home during a meeting with the association of parliamentary journalists – she estimated, on October 20 on France 2that the use of 49.3 was not “a forced passage” and that the Assembly had gone to the end of the debates. She advocated the same method for the Social Security budget (PLFSS), asking to “leave time for discussion”. Without succeeding this time since, the same evening, the Prime Minister drew 49.3 again.
This is not the first time that the elected representative of Yvelines has made a divergent voice heard. On September 22, while the majority is torn on the method to be used to carry out the pension reform, Yael Braun-Pivet sided with François Bayrou by publicly declaring, on franceinfo, that she was not in favor of the option of an amendment to the PLFSS. Applause to the MoDem, where she is seen as “a half god”said a Renaissance deputy. “She showed a form of independence, it was seen on pensions”, greets the deputy MoDem Nicolas Turquois. On the contrary, a Renaissance executive believes that she “could have said it differently” and that he was not “no need to show confrontation”.
Beyond this episode, it is his way of conceiving his function but also his style which sows discord in macronie, between his fans and his detractors. “She is very intelligent, very human, she really is a golden girl”launches the deputy MoDem Bruno Millienne, who is full of praise.
“I do not remember a president – in this case a president – so much in defense of parliamentarians.”
Bruno Millienne, MP for the MoDemat franceinfo
At Horizons too, an influential parliamentarian says he likes the way the perch holder of “to make your difference heard and to be in a form of new style”. Not to everyone’s taste. “It’s not my cup of tea. It’s Ségolène [Royal] again: she always wants to jump from post to post”criticizes a macronist, in reference to the ephemeral passage of Yaël Braun-Pivet as Minister of Overseas. “Yael Braun-Pivet is the revenge of the meanspings a member of the majority. She is the voice of the deputies who are not in the cenacle. Understand: those who have a direct link with the Elysée.
A few months ago, Yaël Braun-Pivet did not actually have a relationship with Emmanuel Macron, who does not know her well. At the time of the election for the presidency of the National Assembly, the Elysée supported Roland Lescure, now Minister Delegate for Industry. “He had a very macronist speech from the first five-year term, in ‘We are the best’ mode. She made a very unifying speech with a real vision of Parliament”, remembers a deputy.
We know the rest: on June 28, the perch returned for the first time to a woman. The next days, Yael Braun-Pivet waited, hoped for a presidential gesture, which never came. No phone call or text message from the head of state. It will be necessary to wait for the course of the summer so that things are finally unblocked and that the two representatives of the executive and legislative powers speak to each other and agree on regular appointments.
These moments of hesitation have left their mark. “Like at the Elysée, they don’t treat her, she won’t wait for them”, slipped at the end of September a parliamentarian close to the former lawyer. Nevertheless, assures a wise observer of power, “Emmanuel Macron did not discover Yaël Braun-Pivet’s position on pensions in the press”. Proof that the two are now communicating. “He understood that it will not be Ferrand [son prédécesseur au perchoir, un très proche du président de la République]. They don’t have the same closeness or even share the same fights.”adds the same source.
For this other majority executive who knows the President of the Assembly well, “Yael Braun-Pivet first has an institutional idea of his function”. But she adds: “The pitfall is that she locks herself in, that she overcultivates this logic of autonomy”.
“That she needs to assert herself to give pledges, okay. But it shouldn’t go too far.”
A framework of the majorityat franceinfo
Some go so far as to attribute presidential ambitions to Yaël Braun-Pivet. “We do the same thing to Elisabeth Borne, we throw in the food the two women who have a mechanical existence by their function”, replies dryly a pro-Braun-Pivet who does not believe for a second in a candidacy. From here 2027, the President of the National Assembly will already have to take up a first challenge: to keep the perch of a hemicycle under the permanent threat of dissolution.