Given the violence of the exchanges and the anathemas exchanged in recent months, no one would have been surprised to hear the spokespersons of Marine Le Pen rejoicing at the disappointments of Eric Zemmour, rolled from the first round of the legislative elections, as all of its candidates.
And yet, since Sunday: nothing. Not a criticism, not a sarcasm against the one whom Marine Le Pen privately accuses of having “rotten the presidential campaign.” But do not believe that the RN is sad about the elimination of the one who claimed to replace him. Behind the scenes, there is laughter. In public, it goes straight. Because there is a second round in four days, and some 965,000 voters slipped a Reconquest ballot on Sunday. So there is no question of alienating potential voice reserves.
Eric Zemmour voters are welcome. Not his political supporters. Tuesday evening on France 2, Marine Le Pen again closed the door to a return of the ex-RNs who had left for Reconquest.
“Storms rid the trees of dead wood. I don’t regret them.”
Marine Le Penon France 2
So much for the four MEPs – Gilbert Collard, Nicolas Bay, Jérôme Rivière, Maxette Pirbakas – left with their mandate… and the money associated with it. The door remains open, however, to zemmourists who have no particular history with the RN. There is also the case of Guillaume Peltier: the former deputy Les Républicains has already tried to join Marine Le Pen before the presidential election. He “has been very affable since the end of April, he sends texts, he knocks on the door“, says an RN executive. Le Pen does not want it because, she says, “He brings bad luck to those he supports”. In politics, there is also an element of irrationality.
Marine Le Pen is ready to store Eric Zemmour in the radius of the relics of the past. “Their destiny, we don’t care a bit, we have turned the page, for us it’s over”, says a spokesperson for the RN. The party predicts at Reconquête the same fate as the MNR of Bruno Mégret, or the Patriotes of Florian Philippot, which exist modestly without winning electoral victories.
In private, Marine Le Pen even dares to bet: that of a war for the presidency of Reconquest, between Marion Maréchal on one side, the Nicolas Bay-Guillaume Peltier tandem on the other. There is a prerequisite for this: that Eric Zemmour renounces this presidency. Scenario he never mentioned.