Politics: There is a red line between Macron and his relative majority
Since June, relations between the Elysee and the Bourbon Palace have become complicated. It is about the departure of some advisers, but above all, it is the lack of trust between the president and the deputies.
There are days when Elisha’s voice has trouble crossing the Seine. Days when the Palais Bourbon seemed deaf to calls from the other side. Castle calls for calm on bullfighting? The Renaissance group is clearly opposed to this. The head of the executive refuses to take a position in the school veil? A handful of Macronist MPs are trying to enforce it… But what’s going on between the president and his majority, which looks more and more like… The opposition group?
MPs need direction
“We don’t know more about Elysee, we don’t have more image, so it spins,” said an elected official. “When I joined LREM, I was in touch with Macron, in the spring, I haven’t been in touch since then,” adds the regretful former minister: “Reform pedagogy is left to the initiative of the group, there is no structured organization. Between the Elysée and the Bourbon Palace. “But it would be necessary, because MPs need a lot of arbitrage, now it’s just in time,” adds a government member. “Suddenly there are ministers helping parliamentarians.” And everyone is exercising their own interests, which are sometimes completely at odds.
President.
However, pension reform is coming. A period of strong turbulence is announced, in which the dissonance between the executive and legislative powers will become more and more dangerous. MPs need a course and this can only be set by the speaker or one of his close followers.
“It is true, today the team has completely changed, the management of the group of deputies is carried out especially after Matignon,” the minister admits. Jérôme Peyrat, in charge of relations with elected officials, left, as did parliamentary adviser Pierre Herrero and political adviser Maxence Barret. That leaves Thierry Soère, who is said to be packing his bags, and Renaissance boss Stéphane Séjourné, the last politician to regularly cross the cock-door. Insufficient according to some old political backpackers. “The Elysée no longer sends anyone to the dining room of the Assembly to take the pulse of the deputies, to get the necessary opinion from the field for any decision,” explains the adviser of the Parliament.
With the Senate, it is the same, a former advisor to the president assures us: “There is no longer an advisor to the Senate in the Elysée, it suddenly took a long time for the executive to understand that it was necessary to put pressure on the Luxembourg Palace to pass the texts”. Larcher, in fact, has not been successful for a long time.
According to a former parliamentarian, a fine connoisseur of Elysian traditions: “Macron’s Jerome Monod (a close adviser to Jacques Chirac’s editor’s note) has disappeared, that is, someone who picks up the phone and shouts at parliamentarians or ministers who joke. He can call knowing that the President has his ear. Alexis Kohler is in charge of France, he can’t do everything. Elected officials cannot call him before the telecast to assess the situation. “What parliamentarians want is someone they can call whenever they want, someone who collects cocoons, heals diseases… I have seen Grégoire Potton (the head of the political pole and note of the parliamentary editor) in recent days, and he is aware of the problem,” he assures us. a former advisor to the castle.
You miss two beings and…
It must be said that two main parts of the first five-year period are now lost.
“The defeats of Richard Ferrand and Christophe Castaner pissed off Macron,” mutters one minister. First of all, they left a huge gap. Since 2020, the Speaker of the Assembly and the chairman of the majority group have been close to the head of state, maintaining constant contact between the two chambers, but now the positions are held by two quasi-opponents, one chosen against the advice of the Elysée.
“Aurore Berge doesn’t act as a mediator at all because she has a huge credibility problem with the President,” exclaims a former centrist elected official. As for Yael Brown-Pivet, who lives in Perch, it took a long time to build a relationship with the president. For some time, Gala refused any report because, against the advice of Alexis Kohler, the preservation of his candidacy was perceived there as a “mini-coup”. But those around them patiently re-weaved the ties. Since then, the two presidents have spoken to each other, preferably face to face.
But this wind of rebellion has left its mark. “These are constitutive acts,” added the former regular at 55 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré, adding, “By making this choice against the advice of the Elysée, deputies have shown they are free.” Since then, relations between the parliament and the head of the executive seem to have reached a dead end and are almost on the verge of breaking down. “The president refuses to spend most of his days there,” the adviser says euphemistically, “but he’s very cyclical, he’ll come back to it.” With a text-based approach to pension reform, the priority will be to pamper the majority who do not offer unwavering support for the time being.
