supporters of the New Popular Front mobilized for a telephone canvassing campaign

Less than two weeks before the first round of the legislative elections, left-wing sympathizers from three citizen collectives “Le Mouvement”, “Victoires populaire” and “Ghett up” are taking action to convince the reluctant and facilitate the proxy process.

The operation was launched on June 18, a reference to the appeal launched by General de Gaulle 84 years ago. 12 days before the first round of legislative elections caused by the surprise dissolution of the Assembly, left-wing activists have decided to launch their own appeal. This is a call for mobilization via a major telephone campaign action to left-wing voters to go to the polls, to vote for the New Popular Front, to increase the number of proxies and to campaign in their immediate circle: family, friends, neighbors. The stated objective is to block the National Rally which is leading in the polls.

Three “phoning” platforms were put into action from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. in Marseille, Lyon and Saint-Denis. “Hello Fabrice, my name is Lisa. I am volunteering to help the Popular Front win the legislative elections on June 30. Am I bothering you?”, Lisa says. She is 27 years old. She is part of a team of around fifty supporters mobilized in Saint-Denis. Most of the operators of a day of action in this large associative premises are not part of any of the signatory parties of the New Popular Front and are between 25 and 30 years old. Sitting at their desks, concentrated in front of their laptops, headphones on, they multiply calls that last two to seven minutes on average. “We have a site that allows you to connect people who are in the same polling station. Would you agree to take the proxy from someone who is not present?”Lisa continues.

The numbers composed by the young woman and her comrades around come from the list of those who, two years ago, organized the popular and citizen primary for a united left. The objective here is for everyone to concentrate on the constituencies throughout France where the result promises to be close, where it can be decided by just a few votes. Before embarking on the marathon, the volunteers are trained for a few minutes by Clément.

In 2020, this young man participated in the phoning operations of the Bernie Sanders campaign in the United States, a model in this area: “We train people in the correct posture in the call, in the script and in the technical tool, the CallHub software. I explain, for example, that to start, you have to smile. This can be heard on the device, it It’s immediately more welcoming. This method of canvassing has proven itself in several countries during various elections, notably in Poland. It has the merit of galvanizing the activists. It’s a bit dizzying. Ourselves, last night when we were setting all that up, we weren’t being smart.”

“We weren’t sure that people would be there. It’s very, very nice.”

“2,076 calls in the morning, that’s great, let’s continue“, says Clément out loud in the open space. “It’s the call of June 18 but it will continue in the following days at least until July 30,” he comments, “Charles de Gaulle did not stop at June 18, he continued the “effort for a moment. It’s a dynamic.”he assures.

In this large room, there is a rest area and a coffee/restaurant area so that everyone can regain their strength when fatigue sets in. On the walls, mobilization messages are hung summoning, among other models of tenacity, Abbot Pierre, with photos and quotes from the abbot.

Élodie, 40, set up an RTT to be there: “In the last half hour I had two people who were ready to make proxies and one person who was ready to do a phone campaign this very evening. It boosts morale. I think we are all anxious about this which could happen on July 7. The risk has never been greater. So in this context, action is the best remedy. Floraine, right next door, motivates the troops: “Our idea is to weave like a large spider’s web, the largest possible and imaginable. We know very well that if a person seeks out three people around them, it can create an exponential movement and completely the difference in the end.”

Behind her, Nicolas, a 30-year-old airline pilot from Paris, traveled to Saint-Denis on a day of rest. Monday evening, he was at the Montreuil rally, will tow tomorrow at the metro exit near his home. For him, phoning is one solution among others to influence the vote of the French. “The urgency of the situation made me decide to give a lot of myself.”he explains.

“I’m not an activist in any party. I’m on the left, that’s all. And I can’t tolerate my country moving to the extreme right.”

“Sometimes on the phone, people tell me that they have family members who vote RN, seduced by the program that they describe as ‘social’ of the National Rally. So in these cases, I whisper to them arguments to retort to help them I just have to look at how in a few days they have already abandoned some of their promises on the VAT reduction or pensions.“, confides the young man.

Some of the left-wing sympathizers joined by the volunteers sometimes say they are reluctant to vote for a union that includes La France insoumise, pointing the finger at “excess”denouncing “equivocal remarks” of some of its leaders. Juliette, in her twenties, for example, has just hung up on her tenth call and says: “I just had a quite interesting conversation with someone who said that he still needed to be reassured about the positions against anti-Semitism that the Popular Front will take. The discussion was quite constructive and he understood that yes, there are things that Jean-Luc Mélenchon says which are not at all the words of the other members of the Popular Front.”

“I reassured him by reminding him that Jean-Luc Mélenchon was not running, that he would not go to Matignon and that he would not have the power that our detractors attribute to him.”

This evening, a volunteer of choice came as reinforcements to make a few phone calls to the Saint-Denis citizen platform to also try to mobilize : the actress Anna Mouglalis, always committed to the left and featured in the political fiction series Black Baron.